LIBRARY 

OF  THE 

University  of  California, 

Mrs.  SARAH  P.  WALSWORTH. 

Received  October,  i8g4, 
^Accessions  ^o.Su^U-L>(i  -      Class  No. 


Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 

in  2007  with  funding  from 

IVIicrbsoft  Corporation 


http://www.archive.org/details/deacongilessdistOOcheerich 


.  '^ 


DEACON    GILES'S 


DISTILLEEY, 


AND 


®t|er  piisnllanits. 


BY 


GEO.  B.   CHEEVER,  D.D. 


NEW  YORK: 
JOHN   AVILEY,   167   BROADWAY. 

1863. 


0f^ 


Entkrkd,  according  to  Act  of  Congress,  in  the  year  1849,  by 

GEORGE    B.    CHEEVEK, 

In  the  Clerk's  Office  of  the  District  Court  of  the  United  States  for  the 
Southern  District  of  New  York. 


THOMAS    B.    SMITH,    STBRKOTYPKR,  ROBKRT    CRAIGUE.VD,    PRINTER. 

216  WILLIAM  8TRKET,  N.  Y. 


PREFACE. 


In  a  great  forest,  when  Spring,  Summer,  and  Autumn 
have  renewed  and  finished  their  work,  the  leaves  that  fall 
off  are  never  lost,  but  still  have  many  uses.  They  may 
pass,  though  trodden  under  foot,  into  the  life  of  brighter 
and  fresher  leaves,  although  they  possess  within  them  no 
power  to  reproduce  a  tree.  Thus  our  thoughts,  aban- 
doned to  the  world,  may  do  some  good,  provided  a  good 
nature  is  in  them,  and  not  the  depravity  and  death  of  our 
moral  nature,  even  though  they  may  seem  to  have  no 
great  active  power,  except  merely  to  weave  a  part  of  the 
common  mould  where  mind  is  nourished.  Still,  if  of  a 
pure  moral  tendency,  they  may  have  a  good  share  of  influ- 
ence in  producing  another  fresh  and  vigorous  foliage.  On 
this  ground,  any  right-minded  Pilgrim  through  our  world 
may  be  pardoned  for  the  publication  of  a  Book  of  Leaves. 

If  they  are  only  leaves,  so  they  be  pure  leaves,  they  can 
do  no  harm.  If  efficacious  seeds  are  found  within  them 
and  among  them,  although  these  be  not  of  much  note  at 
present,  yet  possibly  they  may  grow  the  better  and  more 
surely  for  not  being  noticed,  in  some  minds  on  which  the 
leaves  have  fallen. 

We  cannot  help  thinking  •  and  we  are  ever  influencing 
others  by  our  thoughts ;  for  our  accustomed  thoughts  form 


IV  PREFACE 


our  character,  and  character  is  always  active,  for  evil  or 
for  good.  It  is  therefore  a  Christian  duty  to  use  every 
opportunity  and  occasion  of  circulating  Christian  thought. 
All  such  thought  in  our  world  occupies  a  space  that  might 
otherwise  have  been  forestalled  and  filled  with  evil.  If 
the  work  have  aught  of  good  in  it,  the  Spirit  of  grace 
Divine  can  make  it  active  and  productive.  May  that  be 
granted,  and  its  publication  will  not  be  in  vain. 

New  York,  May  1,  1849. 


^ 


.^ 


# 


C  ONTENTS. 


PART  FIRST. 
ALLEGORICAL    AND    IMAGINATIVE. 

PAGE 

THE    HILL    DIFFICULTY  ;    WITH    THE     JEWISH    PILGRIM's    PROGRESS,  3 

THE    TWO   WAYS    AND    THE    TWO   ENDS.      A    LIFE    ALLEGORY,         .  27 

AN    APOLOGUE    ON    FIRE, 49 

THE    TWO    temptations;    and    THE    DISPOSITION    OF    THEM,             .  60 

THE    LAKE  AMONG  THE  MOUNTAINS  ;   A  CHILd's  LETTER  AND  LESSON,  99 

THE    wrSDOM  OF  ANIMALS  ;    A    FABLE  AFTER  THE  MANNER  OF  ^SOP,  103 

DEACON    GILES'    DISTILLERY, 106 

DEACON   JONES'    BREWERY, 113 

THE     HISTORY    OF     JOHN     STUBBS ;     A     WARNING     TO    RUM-SELLING 

GROCERS, 123 


PART  SECOND. 
DESCRIPTIVE    AND     MEDITATIVE. 

NOTES   OF    NATURE   AT   SARATOGA, 133 

NATURE   IN    THE    BERKSHIRE    MOUNTAINS,   .            .           .            .            .  137 

NATURE    AT   ROCKAWAY, 142 

NATURE    IN   A   TROPICAL   VOYAGE    AT   SEA,             .            .            .            .  145 
THE    DISCONTENTED   LADY-BIRD;   A   PROVERB   ILLUSTRATED,    .            .150 

SECRET   OF    SUCCESS   IN   PREACHING,    .   -       .           .           .           .           .  163 

NATURE   IN   THE    SOUTH  OF    SPAIN, 156 

MALAGA   AND    THE    MEDITERRANEAN,             .           .            .           .           .  160 

MILTON's   CORRESPONDENCE, 169 

FEBRUARY  IN   THE   SOUTH  OF   SPAIN,            •           •           *           •          ^  ^*^^ 
♦                      ,# 


VI  CONTENTS. 

PAOE 

LOOKING    UP    THERE,   AND    DOWN    HERE,               .            .            .           ■»            .  175 

RAKING    WITH    THE    TEETH    UPWARDS, 178 

HEART-LEARNING,              ....                        ....  180 

MORAL    DAGUERREOTYPES, 182 

A   GOOD    OLD    HYMN, .  184 

READINGS    BY     THE     WAYSIDE,    AND     AN     EVENING's    CONVERSATION 

ON   THE    HUDSON, 186 

PRAYER    AND    FASTING, 193 

FIXTURES    OF    CHARACTER, 196 

SIMPLICITY, .           .  200 


PART   THIRD. 
CRITICAL    AND    SPECULATIVE. 

CHARACTERISTICS    OF    THE    CHRISTIAN    PHILOSOPHER,         ,  .  .       203 

LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER, 251 

THE   RELIGION   OF    EXPERIENCE   AND   THAT   OF    IMITATION,         .  .      346 


PAET  EIRST 


ALLEGORICAL   AND   IMAGINATIVE. 


THE   HILL  DIFFICULTY: 


(fe^Ylj 


THE  JEWISH  PILGRIM'S  PROGRESS. 


Every  man  has  a  Hill  Difficulty  to  encounter  in  his 
Christian  life.  We  all  march  upwards,  and  we  have  to 
climb.  There  are  a  thousand  expedients  to  avoid  the  neces- 
sity of  climbing,  but  they  are  very  vain,  and  all  the  way  there 
is  conflict  and  trial.  But  in  proportion  to  the  patient  and 
persevering  zeal  with  which  the  soul  maintains  and  endures 
the  conflict,  will  be  the  ease  with  which  afterwards  it  shall 
be  borne  forward  in  the  victory.  At  the  summit  of  the 
Hill  there  are  winged  cars,  in  which  you  step,  and  are  carried 
swiftly  and  sweetly  onwards.  Such  is  the  power  of  Chris- 
tian habit.  It  is  a  Hill  Difficulty  at  first,  it  is  a  winged  car 
at  last.  "  They  that  wait  upon  the  Lord  shall  renew  their 
strength  ;  they  shall  mount  up  with  wings  as  eagles ;  they 
shall  run  and  not  be  weary,  they  shall  walk  and  not  faint." 
"It  is  God  that  girdeth  me  with  strength,  and  maketh  my 
way  perfect.  He  maketh  my  feet  like  hinds'  feet,  and  set- 
teth  me  upon  my  high  places." 

The  time  of  trial  must  be  encountered.  We  will  not 
say  whether  it  lasts  the  life  long,  or  precisely  at  what 
point  the  habits  become  wings ;  whether  the  cars  at  the 
top  of  the  Hill  are  those  which  receive  the  soul  at  death, 
and  cause  it  to  glide  through  the  air  to  the  abodes  of  the 
blessed,  or  whether  the   movement  begins  this  side  the 


4  THE    HILL    DIFFICULTY. 

grave,  by  the  top  of  the  Hill  being  reached  before  death, 
and  the  airy  flight  of  the  soul  beginning  even  in  the  body, 
through  the  great  celestial  power  of  peace  v^ith  God,  and 
a  love  and  joy  unspeakable  and  full  of  glory.  We  think 
Paul  stepped  into  those  winged  cars  before  he  put  off  his 
mortal  tabernacle.  And  every  Christian  may  do  so,  for 
God  has  made  it  possible.  But  it  depends  greatly  on  the 
manner  in  which  the  Pilgrim  travels  up  the  Hill,  in  those 
parts  of  the  pilgrimage  where  climbing  is  necessary.  "  My 
soul  followeth  hard  after  thee  ;  thy  right  hand  upholdeth 
me."  There  must  be  labor,  intense  labor.  "  Striving 
according  to  his  working,  that  worketh  in  me  mightily." 
That  was  Paul's  experience.  "So  run  I,  not  as  uncer- 
tainly, so  fight  I,  not  as  one  that  beateth  the  air.  I  would 
that  ye  knew  my  conflict.  Night  and  day  praying  ex- 
ceedingly." 

We  say  not,  therefore,  when  the  top  of  the  hill  is  reached, 
or  may  he  reached,  but  this  we  do  say,  that  the  Hill  Diffi- 
culty is  long,  and  the  climbing  of  it  is  a  great  discipline 
for  every  soul.  This  also  we  say,  that  Christian  habit, 
though  diffioult  in  the  formation  and  establishment,  turns 
into  wings,  and  whereas  at  first  the  soul  had  to  carry  its 
habits  forward  with  great  difficulty  and  labor,  at  the  last 
habit  carries  the  soul  forward. 

I  had  a  sight  of  this  Hill  Difliculty  lately,  as  in  a  trance, 
in  which  I  looked,  and  saw  a  great  variety  of  characters 
laboring  up.  There  was  a  bright  light  at  the  summit,  and 
a  vast,  dark,  wild-looking  plain  at  the  base  ;  but  so  far  as 
sight  was  concerned,  the  Hill  seemed  to  me  to  constitute 
the  whole  of  the  Christian  life  ;  for  the  top  of  the  Hill,  and 
the  winged  cars  in  waiting,  were  out  of  sight  ordinarily, 
and  only  now  and  then  I  seemed  to  be  raised  where  I 
could  see  them  floating  in  light.  But  I  watched  with 
exceeding  great  interest  the  progress  of  the  various  multi- 
tude. Some  were  going  up,  some  were  going  back.  Some 
set  out  with  great  apparent  zeal  at  first,  but  soon  became 


THE    HILL    DIFFICULTY.  O 

tired,  and  turned  away  disgusted  with  the  labor.  I  thought 
of  the  text,  that  the  hypocrite  will  not  always  call  upon 
God,  and  also  of  the  text,  "  He  that  endure th  to  the  end, 
the  same  shall  be  saved;"  and  also  of  that,  ''  Ye  have  need 
of  patience,  and  shall  live  by  faith  ;  but  if  any  man  draw 
back,  my  soul  hath  no  pleasure  in  him." 

Some  seemed  to  take  the  Hill  very  hard,  others  more 
leisurely.  Some  disencumbered  themselves  of  everything 
but  what  was  absolutely  necessary  to  a  becoming  appear- 
ance as  Pilgrims,  saying  among  themselves,  We  brought 
nothing  into  the  world,  and  it  is  certain  that  we  can  carry 
nothing  out ;  others  took  an  immense  quantity  of  luggage, 
and  various  unnecessary  burdens  along  with  them.  I 
thought  of  the  text,  "  Laying  aside  every  weight,  and  the 
sin  that  doth  so  easily  beset  us,  let  us  run  with  patience 
the  race  that  is  set  before  us."  Some  laid  in  a  great  stock 
of  provisions,  and  even  of  fresh  water,  for  the  top  of  the 
Hill,  fearful  that  by  and  by  they  might  find  themselves 
destitute  of  everything  tc  eat  and  drink  ;  others  seemed  to 
have  little  or  no  anxiety  about  the  future,  but  just  to  get 
forward.  I  thought  of  the  text,  "  Sufficient  unto  the  day 
is  the  evil  thereof,"  and  also  of  our  Lord's  prayer,  *'  Give 
us,  day  by  day^  our  daily  bread."  And  I  thought  of  the 
text,  "  He  shall  drink  of  the  brook  by  the  way  ;"  for  there 
was  a  stream  of  living  water  running  down  the  Hill,  by 
the  way-side,  from  top  to  bottom,  and  there  was  no  need 
of  any  one  suffering  from  thirst,  whose  soul  thirsted  after 
God. 

Some  of  the  Pilgrims  were  in  plain  russet  garb — travel- 
stained  and  dusty,  yet  strong  and  useful  garments,  easily 
brushed,  and  fitted  for  a  path  over  craggy  mountains. 
There  were  others  in  elegant  and  costly  dresses,  with  gold 
and  pearls,  and  broidered  array,  which  it  cost  a  great  deal 
of  time  and  care  to  keep  in  the  least  order,  and  which 
greatly  interfered  with  the  progress  of  the  wearers.  In- 
deed, to  see  them  thus  arrayed  for  so  laborious  a  pilgrimage 


6  THE    HILL    DIFFICULTY. 

seemed  quite  ridiculous.  I  thought  of  Peter^s  warning 
about  the  hidden  man  of  the  heart,  and  the  ornament  of  a 
meek  and  quiet  spirit,  and  I  remembered  also  that  beautiful 
remark  of  good  Archbishop  Leigh  ton,  that  we  must  keep 
our  loins  girt  up,  and  cannot  wear  our  flowing  robes  here 
in  our  pilgrimage,  for  they  will  be  dragged  in  the  mire,  or 
perhaps  will  entangle  our  feet  in  climbing ;  but  that  when 
we  get  to  heaven  we  can  wear  our  long  flowing  robes 
without  danger  of  defilement,  for  the  streets  of  that  city 
are  pure  gold. 

It  may  seem  strange,  but  it  is  no  less  true,  that  there 
were  some  who  made  great  provision  for  amusements  by 
the  way,  thinking  that  it  would  be  a  dreary  life  if  they 
had  nothing  to  do  but  climbing.  Sometimes  they  went  so 
far  as  to  club  together,  and  hire  companies  of  musicians, 
who  could  pitch  a  tent  here  and  there,  where  a  bit  of  table- 
land, with  green  grass,  might  be  found  among  the  crags 
of  the  Hill,  as  often  perhaps  as  every  Saturday  night,  and 
so  enliven  the  pilgrimage.  Out  of  these  materials  they  con- 
trived to  make  up  a  kind  of  Christian  Opera,  which  was 
thought  to  be  good  for  low  spirits.  And  besides  this,  they 
had  various  Tabernacular  concerts,  imitated  from  the  plains 
below,  and  public  readings  of  Shakspeare.  It  was  said  to  be 
as  great  a  shame  that  the  devil  should  keep  all  the  amuse- 
ments of  life  for  his  purposes  in  the  plains,  as  that  he 
should  keep  all  the  best  music  to  himself,  as  he  always  had 
done.  It  was  argued  also,  that  if  some  of  the  same  fun 
which  they  had  in  the  plains  were  not  carried  up  the  Hill, 
and  kept  in  exercise  there,  (only  consecrated,  of  course,) 
people  fond  of  the  gayeties  of  life,  and  especially  children, 
could  not  be  induced  to  set  out  from  the  plains  below,  to  go 
up  the  Hill  Difficulty.  It  was  argued  also,  that  the  Hill 
had  been  long  enough,  and  too  long,  occupied  only  with  sour- 
faced  Puritans,  with  the  whites  of  their  eyes  turned  up, 
(see  Macaulay's  History  of  England)  and  speaking  through 
their  noses,  and  that  it  was  high  time  there  should  be  a 


THE    HILL    DIFFICULTY.  7 

sweeter,  more  accommodating  and  genteel  kind  of  piety. 
Some  thought  that  these  things  could  better  be  managed  by- 
all  for  themselves,  without  need  of  any  regulations,  and  that 
they  might  very  well  have  dancing  schools  for  the  children, 
and  French  conversations  to  keep  up  their  accomplishments. 
One  lady  remarked  that  for  her  part,  she  always,  in  travel- 
ling, took  her  Bible  and  Byron,  and  did  not  need  anything 
else.  There  were  many  discussions  about  these  things, 
and  various  opinions. 

For  my  part,  I  thought  of  Paul's  instructions,  "  See  then 
that  ye  walk  circumspectly,  not  as  fools,  but  as  wise,  re- 
deeming the  time,  because  the  days  are  evil :  speaking  to 
yourselves  in  psalms,  and  hymns,  and  spiritual  songs,  sing- 
ing and  making  melody  in  your  heart  to  the  Lord."  And 
I  thought  of  the  text  in  James,  which  some  regarded  as 
rather  quaint,  "  Is  any  among  you  afflicted  ?  let  him  pray. 
Is  any  merry?  let  him  sing  psalrfts."  And  I  could  not 
help  thinking  also  of  Peter,  "  Be  sober,  be  vigilant :  And  if 
ye  call  on  the  Father,  pass  the  time  of  your  sojourning  in 
fear."  I  thought  also  of  the  experience  of  Solomon,  who 
sought  upon  a  time  to  go  up  this  same  Hill  Difficulty  with 
men-singers  and  women-singers,  and  the  delights  of  the 
sons  of  men,  musical  instruments,  and  that  of  all  sorts; 
and  who,  moreover,  took  up  great  possessions  of  great  and 
small  cattle  into  the  Hill,  and  builded  him  houses,  and 
planted  him  vineyards,  and  made  him  gardens  and  orchards. 
But  he  found  out,  after  all,  that  that  was  not  the  way,  but 
that  all  was  vanity  and  vexation  of  spirit.  And  I  heard 
him  say  himself,  that  a  single  handful  is  better  with  quiet- 
etness,  than  both  hands  full  with  vexation  of  spirit.  Also 
I  heard  him  say,  that  the  laughter  of  the  fool  is  as  the 
crackling  of  thorns  under  a  pot,  and  that  it  is  better  to  hear 
the  rebuke  of  the  wise,  than  the  song  of  fools.  Also  he 
said,  that  the  house  of  mirth  was  the  fool's  heart's  tavern ; 
and  that,  on  the  whole,  sorrow  was  better  than  laughter. 

I  am  now  to  speak  of  a  strange  thing.     There  were 


8 


THE    HILL    DIFFICULTY. 


here  and  there,  at  the  sides  of  the  way  up  the  Hill,  Patent 
Offices,  where  machines  had  been  invented  to  take  Pilgrims 
up  without  climbing ;  not  for  tlfe  sick  and  feeble,  the  help- 
less and  aged  merely,  but  for  all,  without  respect  to  class, 
character,  or  condition.  There  was  particularly  such  an 
Office,  much  frequented,  of  late  times  especially,  at  the 
junction  between  the  plains  and  the  Hill  Difficulty,  at  the 
very  entrance  upon  the  hill.  There  had  been  constructed 
there  a  great  balloon,  to  avoid  climbing,  named  Baptismal 
Regeneration,  in  which,  by  an  ingenious  chemical  use  of  a 
little  font  of  water,  a  very  subtle  light  gas  was  manufac- 
tured to  fill  the  balloon  ;  and  then  the  adventurers  in  it, 
having  been  made  to  inhale  the  same  gas,  stepped  into  a 
car  to  which  the  balloon  was  attached,  and  were  carried 
along  quite  swiftly  at  the  start,  half-floating,  half-dragging. 
These  adventurers  all  lost  their  lives  in  the  end,  unless 
they  got  out  of  the  ear,  and  took  to  the  real  pilgrimage, 
without  the  patent ;  for,  at  a  certain  point  in  the  journey 
there  was  a  strong  wind,  that  took  the  balloon  out  of  its  in- 
tended course,  and  the  cars  were  dashed  in  pieces.  But 
notwithstanding  this,  the  patentees  insisted  on  this  being 
the  only  way  of  salvation.  They,  and  they  only,  it  was 
said,  had  received  the  patent,  and  been  appointed  for  its 
sole  management  by  commission  from  the  apostles.  It  was  a 
dreadful  hallucination  ;  the  more  so,  because  it  was  adopted 
beforehand  by  a  great  many  people  in  the  plains,  who  felt 
very  sure  that  they  need  give  themselves  no  anxiety  about 
getting  up  the  Hill,  as  the  balloon  was  always  ready,  and 
therefore,  start  whenever  they  might,  there  was  no  fear  for 
them,  nor  any  need  of  hurrying. 

Hard  by  this  Office,  and  in  league  with  the  balloon  sys- 
tem, there  was  another,  kept  by  that  son  of  Abraham  who 
was  by  a  bond- woman,  born  after  the  flesh  ;  he  kept  charge 
of  Jerusalem  which  now  is,  and  is  in  bondage  with  her 
children.  He  persecuted  him  that  was  born  after  the 
Spirit,  and  in  time  past  had  thrown  a  great  bar  across  the 


THE    HILL    DIFFICULTY.  9" 

way  of  the  pilgrims,  making  it  a  State-turnpike  instead  of 
a  free  road,  and  letting  none  pass  but  such  as  would  pay- 
tribute,  and  swear  themselves  subjects  of  the  son  of  Hagar, 
and  of  Jerusalem  in  bondage.  But  the  Lord  of  the  Hill 
ordered  the  bar  to  be  taken  down,  and  all  hindrances  to  be 
removed  out  of  the  way,  declaring  that  all  who  were  bap- 
tized into  Christ  had  put  on  Christ,  and  were  one  in  Christ 
Jesus,  while  those  who  had  not  this  true  baptism  by  his 
Spirit  in  their  hearts,  were  none  the  better  for  the  external 
rite  of  baptism.  For  he  said  that  in  Christ  Jesus  neither 
circumcision  availed  anything,  nor  uncircumcision,  but  a 
new  creature,  and  that  the  sinner  could  not  be  justified  by 
anything  but  faith.  Moreover,  he  said  that  the  son  of  the 
bondwoman  should  not  be  heir  with  the  son  of  the  free 
woman.  And  he  commanded  all  the  Pilgrims  to  stand  fast 
in  the  liberty  wherewith  Christ  had  made  them  free,  and 
not  to  be  entangled  again  in  the  yoke  of  bondage. 

The  people  of  the  plains  sometimes  went  to  law  about 
these  balloons,  with  another  great  party,  that  claimed  the 
honor  of  having  invented  them  long  before,  and  of  having 
the  only  right  to  use  them.  It  was  said  that  they  belonged 
in  the  first  place  to  the  Pope  of  Rome,  and  that  he  having 
charged  too  high  for  the  use  of  them,  this  second  party  had 
pirated  the  invention,  and  ever  since  the  time  of  Luther, 
had  combined  with  several  States  to  put  it  at  a  lower  rate, 
and  for  a  long  time  likewise,  made  almost  everybody  come 
into  it.  Now,  however,  the  combination  between  Church 
and  State  being  much  broken  up,  people  were  not  com- 
pelled to  employ  the  balloons  as  formerly,  and  great  multi- 
tudes went  up  the  Hill  without  them,  well  knowing  how 
dangerous  it  was  to  trust  in  them.  Moreover,  of  those 
who  had  been  in  the  habit  of  manufacturing  and  of  patron- 
izing the  pirated  invention,  there  were  not  a  few  returning 
to  the  old  original  balloon  of  the  Pope,  thinking  themselves 
safer,  on  the  whole,  in  that,  and  determining  henceforward, 
if  they  must  use  either,  to  abide  ?;}y  the  real  Simon  Pure. 

1* 


10  THE    HILL    DIFFICULTY. 

It  was  said  that  Simon  Peter  himself  had  given  it  with  his 
own  hands  to  the  Pope,  and  a  great  many  Tracts  for  the 
Times  were  written  to  prepare  men's  minds  for  a  return  to 
the  general  use  of  it.  After  the  year  1848,  some  said  that 
if  it  were  found  necessary,  Peter  would  undoubtedly  give 
the  Pope  a  second  balloon  to  carry  him  back  from  Gaieta 
to  Rome,  and  keep  him  suspended,  untouched  and  intan- 
gible, in  his  temporal  sovereignty. 

There  was  another  patent  higher  up  the  Hill  Difficulty 
than  this,  called  Perfection ;  where  the  souls  of  the  pil- 
grims that  were  willing  to  undergo  the  operation,  were 
fitted,  or  appeared  to  be  fitted,  with  wings,  after  having 
been  made  to  drink  of  a  very  penetrating  and  delicious 
cordial,  entitled  self-esteem.  This  cordial  was  made  up, 
in  part,  out  of  the  elements  of  past  experience,  kept  till 
they  were  rotten  ;  after  which,  like  the  process  of  malt 
liquor,  made  out  of  pure  grain,  the  cordial  being  distilled, 
got  into  the  head  and  heart,  and  prepared  its  subjects  for 
the  most  venturesome  and  desperate  expedients  with  those 
artificial  wings.  Men  could  go  with  them  to  the  edge  of 
steep  precipices,  where  they  sometimes  threw  themselves 
off,  and  were  dashed  in  pieces,  or,  in  endeavoring  to  fly, 
stumbled  and  fell.  Sometimes  the  fall  broke  off  their  wings 
without  killing  them,  and  then,  after  great  labor  and  pain, 
they  found  their  way  back  again  into  the  right  road  upon 
the  Hill,  where,  without  any  more  patent  wings,  they 
went  anxiously  and  sadly  all  their  days.  But  it  was  a 
very  dangerous  delusion,  and  some  who  were  carried  away 
by  it,  forsook  the  Hill  Difficulty  altogether,  and  threw  off 
all  law,  saying  that  they  were  not  under  law  but  under 
grace  ;  and  so  they  set  up  in  the  wilderness  an  establish- 
ment something  like  the  system  of  Communism  or  Fourier- 
ism,  where  they  had  all  things  common  except  the  Water 
of  Life,  which  was  not  to  be  had  among  them. 

Of  those  who  were  climbing  up  the  Hill  in  the  right 
way,  there  was  a  great  variety  of  persons  and  of  characters. 


THE    HILL    DIFFICULTY.  11 

Some  moved  confident  and  light-hearted,  some  went  de- 
sponding and  much  burdened.  Some  went  at  a  very  snail's 
pace,  some  more  swiftly,  some  seemed  for  a  long  while  to 
be  standing  still.  Some  few  shot  upward  with  an  earnestness 
and  vigor  most  surprising  and  animating  to  look  at.  And 
what  seemed  a  little  strange,  the  more  heart  and  strength 
were  put  into  the  work  of  climbing,  the  less  the  fatigue  ap- 
peared to  be  felt.  Indeed,  the  air  grew  more  bracing  and 
clearer,  the  farther  they  went  up,  and  the  prospect  every- 
where began  to  be  glorious.  I  thought  of  our  Lord's 
words,  "  He  that  folio weth  me  shall  not  walk  in  darkness, 
but  shall  have  the  light  of  life."  And  sometimes  there 
seemed  to  be  a  mist  of  light  in  the  clouds  above  the  Hill, 
in  which,  when  the  climbers  at  a  hard  part  of  the  pilgrim- 
age looked  steadily  up,  the  words  of  that  great  promise 
were  seen  distinctly  shining,  ''  Blessed  is  the  man  that  en- 
dureth  temptation  ;  for  when  he  is  tried  he  shall  receive 
the  crown  of  life,  which  the  Lord  hath  promised  to  them 
that  love  him."  In  very  clear  weather  these  glittering 
words  could  be  seen  from  the  top  to  the  bottom  of  the  Hill, 
and  they  were  like  a  crown  of  blazing  jewels,  set  upon  a 
city  battlement,  and  the  sight  of  them  sometimes  prevented 
Pilgrims,  even  at  the  plains,  from  getting  into  the  patent 
balloon  cars  instead  of  climbing,  and  sent  them  on,  with  a 
great  impulse,  rejoicing  even  in  the  discipline  of  trial,  and 
struggling  up  the  Hill. 

There  were  steady  climbers,  and  there  were  inconstant, 
fitful  ones.  There  were  those  of  strong  faith,  who  girded 
up  the  loins  of  their  minds,  and  hoped  to  the  end,  and 
there  were  those  who  were  constantly  doubting  they 
should  never  get  to  the  top  of  the  Hill.  Some  would  go 
like  the  wind  for  a  few  days  or  hours,  seeming  as  though 
they  would  outstrip  all  competitors.  Then  they  would 
stop  by  the  way-side  to  gather  some  rock-crystals,  or 
would  engage  in  some  disquisition  about  wings,  and  some- 
times were  tempted  to  step  into  the   patent   office,   and 


12  THE    HILL    DIFFICULTY. 

lost  much  time  in  this  way  and  that,  instead  of  climbing. 
Others  seemed  to  be  continually  thinking  of  their  comfort 
in  climbing,  having  some  way  got  the  notion  that  the 
proof  of  their  progi*ess  lay  in  the  sensible  delight  which 
they  experienced  in  the  work.  This  was  a  great  injury 
both  to  their  advancement  and  happiness.  They  some- 
times envied  those  patent  wings,  though  they  did  not  dare 
really  to  try  them.  I  thought  of  David,  when  he  was 
climbing,  and  was  forced  to  come  down  upon  his  hands 
and  knees,  with  the  way  so  dark,  moreover,  that  he  could 
see  no  light ;  and  I  thought  if  he  had  been  in  the  liabit  of 
making  his  hope  and  his  evidence  to  depend  upon  his  com- 
fort, he  would  twenty  times  have  given  up  in  utter  despair. 
But  he  cried  unto  God  in  the  day  of  his  trouble,  and 
climbed  on,  even  when  his  soul  refused  to  be  comforted. 
He  was  still  thinking  of  the  next  step.  "  From  the  end 
of  the  earth  will  I  cry  unto  thee  when  my  heart  is  over- 
whelmed ;  lead  me  to  the  rock  that  is  higher  than  I." 
Sometimes  David  himself  said,  "  O,  that  I  had  wings  like 
a  dove  !"  But  he  never  applied  at  the  Patent  Office.  And 
when  he  really  had  wings,  and  was  singing  like  a  lark 
because  of  what  God  had  done  for  him,  he  said  he  was  a 
poor  and  needy  sinner,  whose  only  hope  was  that  the  Lord 
was  thinking  upon  him.  Blessed  is  the  man  that  maketh 
the  Lord  his  trust,  and  respecteth  not  such  as  turn  aside 
to  lies.  Those  that,  hke  David,  thirsted  after  God,  rather 
than  for  comfort,  and  preferred  a  clean  heart  before  a  merry 
one,  found  comfort  enough  without  thinking  of  it.  I  ob- 
served that  when,  according  to  David's  experience,  their 
souls  in  climbing  labored  hard  after  G;od,  tlien  they  had 
also  David's  assurance  of  the  right  hand  of  God  upholding 
them. 

The  steady  climbers  of  course  made  the  surest  progress. 
They  went  straight  onward,  and  if  a  very  rough  place 
came  in  their  way,  such  was  the  habitual  directness  and 
intensity  of  their  zeal,  such  their  habit  of  application  to  the 


THE    HILL    DIFFICULTY.  13 

pilgrimage,  that  almost  before  they  had  time  to  think 
whether  there  might  be  an  easier  way,  they  found  them- 
selves entered  upon  the  difficult,  rough  passage,  without 
attempting  to  go  round  it.  But  these  steady  climbers  had 
for  their  motto,  "  I  will  go  in  the  strength  of  the  Lord 
God  ;  I  will  make  mention  of  thy  righteousness,  even  of 
thine  only."  And  also  this  :  '^  I  can  do  all  things  through 
Christ  who  strengtheneth  me."  Their  combined  intensity 
and  perseverance  was  the  effect,  under  God's  grace,  of 
continued,  strong,  steady.  Christian  habit.  It  was  like  the 
impulse  of  a  swift  skater,  the  application  of  whose  muscular 
energy  has  given  him  such  power  of  impetus,  that  if  he 
should  attempt  to  stand  still,  the  very  habit  of  motion  will 
carry  him  swiftly  forward.  These  steady  climbers  had 
thus  gained  the  power  of  a  continued  impulse,  without 
relying  on  it.  Their  whole  reliance  was  on  Christ. 
"  "Without  me,  ye  can  do  nothing." 

They  made  much  use,  unceasing  use,  of  prayer.  Prayer 
and  God's  Word,  indeed,  kept  up  a  fire  within  them,  that 
seemed  to  scorn  the  cold,  the  rain,  the  fatigue,  without 
them.  And  it  was  observed,  that  while  these  steady 
climbers  had  great  enjoyment  by  the  way,  they  did  not 
stop  to  ponder  upon  it,  to  luxuriate  over  it,  as  it  were,  but 
still  pressed  upward,  always  eager  to  advance.  I  thought 
of  Paul's  relation  of  some  passages  in  the  history  of  his 
own  soul :  "  I  count  not  myself  to  have  attained  or  to  have 
become  perfect ;  but  this  one  thing  I  do,  forgetting  the 
things  which  are  behind,  and  reaching  on  after  those  that 
are  before,  I  press  towards  the  mark  of  the  prize  of  the 
high  calling  of  God  in  Christ  Jesus."  Indeed,  according 
to  the  experience  of  another  great  old  climber,  who  once 
slept  in  the  Arbor  on  the  Hill,  in  consequence  of  very  de- 
light in  pondering  over  his  joy,  and  who  for  a  season  lost 
his  roll  in  consequence  of  that  sleep,  it  was  observed  that 
those  who,  even  in  a  very  clear  frame  of  mind,  began  to 
sit  down  and   delight  themselves  with  reading  their  roll, 

it'' 


14 


THE    HILL    DIFFICULTY. 


soon  grew  confused  again,  and  lost  their  place  in  it,  or  fell 
asleep  and  mislaid  it.  It  was  not  by  pondering  their  own 
experience,  and  delighting  in  that,  but  by  pondering  God's 
word,  and  delighting  themselves  in  God,  that  they  found 
the  desire  of  their  hearts,  and  went  safely  onwards. 
"  Thou  wilt  light  my  candle,"  says  David:  ''  the  Lord  my 
God  will  enlighten  my  darkness.  Thou  wilt  show  me  the 
path  of  life :  in  thy  light  shall  we  see  light." 

Moreover,  the  best  climbers  did  not  compare  themselves 
with  one  another's  progresses,  but  measured  the  Hill,  and 
thought  how  far  still  they  were  from  the  top  of  it.  On  the 
other  hand,  a  great  many  seemed  to  think  that  if  they  did 
but  go  as  fast  as  their  neighbors,  they  were  in  very  good 
case,  and  had  no  occasion  for  anxiety.  This  evil  was  the 
source  of  a  very  slow  advancement  with  many,  who  never, 
in  consequence  of  this  very  thing,  got  to  the  top  of  the 
Hill,  to  the  winged  cars,  as  long  as  they  lived,  but  were  all 
their  life-time  subject  to  bondage. 

In  the  variety  of  character  among  the  true  Pilgrims, 
you  might  distinguish  several  prevailing  forms,  singularly 
separate  and  distinct,  the  work  of  particular  individual 
undercurrents  of  temperament  and  habit,  modifying  the 
direct  ideally  perfect  result  of  the  workings  of  that  One 
and  the  self-same  Spirit,  who  divideth  to  every  man  sev- 
erally as  he  will.  There  were  the  brooding  Pilgrims,  bent 
down,  and  looking  into  self,  sometimes  so  intent  on  this 
inspection,  so  absorbed  in  it,  that  they  could  see  nothing 
else,  not  even  the  path  before  them,  nor  seemed  to  notice 
any  of  their  fellows ;  and  in  consequence  of  this  brooding, 
they  often  stumbled  up  the  Hill  rather  than  climbed,  but 
still  more  frequently  thought  they  were  advancing,  while 
they  were  only  standing  still  and  groaning.  They  needed 
to  look  out  of  self  up  to  the  top  of  the  Hill  and  the  Lord 
of  the  Hill.  And  I  observed  that  in  this  desperate  brood- 
ing over  self,  instead  of  the  consequence  being  a  sympathy 
with  others'  distresses,  they  seemed  to  think  only  of  their 


THE    HILL    DIFFICULTY.  15 

own,  and  fell  into  the  imagination  that  the  great  weight 
and  care  of  their  own  sins  and  sorrows  unfitted  them  for 
any  active  part  in  helping  others,  or  excused  them  from  it ; 
which  was  a  great  mistake.  I  heard  of  one  great  Pilgrim, 
who  once  for  a  season  was  in  danger  of  this  habit,  but 
afterwards  by  the  grace  of  Christ,  and  by  looking  to  Christ, 
got  out  of  it,  who  exclaimed  in  a  voice  loud  enough  to  be 
heard  all  the  way  down  the  Hill,  No  good  ever  comes  of 
brooding  ! 

There  were  also  the  legal  Pilgrims,  looking  to  duties 
rather  than  Christ,  as  the  others  did  to  frames  rather  than 
Christ.  The  tendency  of  this  was  to  injure,  if  not  to  spoil 
both  their  duties  and  their  frames — ^both  their  works  and 
their  faith  ;  and  in  truth  their  ideas  of  faith  were  very 
much  clouded  and  darkened,  and  their  souls  were  kept  in 
bondage.  For  they  could  not  satisfy  conscience,  and  yet 
they  looked  very  much  to  that  for  justification  and  com- 
fort ;  but  this  they  could  not  find,  without  casting  all  on 
Christ  daily,  and  having  him  and  his  love  as  the  spring 
and  strength  of  duty,  and  receiving  his  pardon  daily,  as 
guilty  and  lost,  but  believing,  trusting,  loving,  and  obeying 
out  of  love.  The  havoc  made  with  the  comfort  and  fer- 
vor of  the  Pilgrims  by  this  want  of  faith  and  love,  and  this 
legal  resort  to  forms  of  duty  as  a  kind  of  purchase-money, 
was  very  sad.  They  had  a  sort  of  measuring  rod  of  Moses, 
by  which  they  endeavored  to  graduate  their  steps  and 
guage  their  progress,  instead  of  walking  by  the  Law  of  the 
Spirit  of  Life  in  Christ  Jesus.  The  Lord  of  the  Hill  had 
been  at  great  pains  to  keep  them  from  this  evil,  and  had 
taught  very  clearly  the  difference  between  children  and 
slaves,  and  had  told  them  that  in  Christ  they  were  chil- 
dren,  and  must  walk  in  love,  as  dear  children.  "  Ye  have 
not,"  said  he,  "received  the  spirit  of  bondage  again  to  fear, 
but  ye  have  received  the  Spirit  of  Adoption,  whereby  ye 
cry  Abba,  Father." 

It  was  evident  that  in  many  cases  this  difiiculty  grew 


16  THE    HILL    DIFFICULTY. 

out  of  the  wrong  mould  in  which  their  views  and  habits 
had  been  run  by  defective  human  teaching.  One  of  the 
Pilgrims  themselves,  who  had  had  much  to  do  in  leading 
souls  to  Christ,  once  told  me,  of  his  own  accord,  that  it 
often  seemed  to  him,  as  if  he,  and  many  other  ministers 
of  the  gospel,  had  too  much  imitated  the  example  of  Moses, 
who  led  his  father  Jethro's  flock  to  the  back  side  of  the 
desert  and  came  to  the  mountain  of  God,  even  to  Horeb. 
But  he  said  it  was  a  cruelty  to  detain  the  flock  of  our 
Saviour  in  the  dreary  wilderness,  before  the  thundering, 
quaking  mountain.  We  are  not  come  to  the  mount  that 
might  be  touched,  to  blackness,  and  darkness  and  tempest ; 
but  we  are  come  to  Mount  Zion,  to  the  City  of  the  living 
God,  to  an  innumerable  company  of  angels,  to  the  general 
assembly  and  Church  of  the  first-born,  to  God  the  Judge 
of  all,  to  Jesus  the  Mediator  of  the  New  Covenant,  and  to 
the  blood  of  sprinkling,  that  speaketh  better  things  than 
that  of  Abel.  Moses,  said  he,  is  dead,  and  the  Lord  has 
buried  him,  and  no  man  knows  of  his  sepulchre  to  this  day. 
Let  us  not  be  his  disciples,  as  the  Jews  foolishly  boasted 
that  they  were,  but  rather  be  the  disciples  of  our  blessed 
Lord,  whom  God  raised  from  the  dead,  and  placed  at  his 
own  right  hand  in  heavenly  places,  as  Head  over  all  things 
to  the  Church. 

There  were  also  the  sympathizing  Pilgrims,  a  very 
beautiful  type  of  character,  who,  whatever  might  be  the 
difficulties  they  had  to  encounter  in  the  way,  took  always 
a  deep  interest  in  those  struggling  around  them.  If  a  fel- 
low-Pilgrim fell  down,  they  were  at  his  side  in  a  moment. 
You  could  never  hear  them  speaking  evil  of  any  man,  and 
they  had  such  a  loving  charitable  judgment,  (so  long  as 
they  did  not  really  know  evil  of  any  man)  that  it  was 
sweet  to  see  them.  There  was  a  great  deal  of  scandal 
and  gossip  on  the  Hill,  among  some,  whom  Paul  in  the 
Directory  had  described  as  "working  not  at  all,  but  busy- 
bodies,  idle,  and  tattlers,  and  speaking  things  which  they 


THE    HILL    DIFFICULTY.  17 

ought  not."  These  would  often  get  together  and  make 
terrible  work  with  other's  reputations,  having  a  curious 
kind  of  Dorcas'  societies  for  tearing  clothes,  not  for  making 
or  mending  them ;  and  yet  with  all  this,  they  were  very 
severe  upon  the  concerts  and  other  things  which  some  other 
of  the  Pilgrims  patronized.  The  truly  charitable  Pilgrims 
did  their  best  to  put  a  stop  to  all  scandal,  and  if  their 
example  had  been  followed,  there  would  have  been  no  such 
thing.  They  prayed  much  for  all  that  were  upon  the  Hill, 
and  helped  others  to  grow  in  grace,  and  their  tenderness  to 
the  poor  and  feeble  was  lovely  to  behold,  and  also  to  those 
who  had  gone  astray.  They  might  sometimes  be  heard, 
while  climbing  the  Hill,  repeating  to  themselves  the  pas- 
sage, "  Considering  thyself,  lest  thou  also  be  tempted." 
They  also  made  much  of  Paul's  injunction,  "  to  lift  up  the 
hands  which  hang  down,  and  the  feeble  knees ;  and  make 
straight  paths  for  your  feet,  lest  that  which  is  lame  be 
turned  out  of  the  way ;  but  let  it  rather  be  healed."  It  was 
very  evident  that  the  more  they  were  interested  in  others, 
the  happier  they  were  in  themselves ;  and  though  they  took 
so  much  time  for  these  acts  of  kindness  and  love  in  helping 
others  to  climb,  yet  they  seemed  themselves  to  make  an 
easier  and  more  rapid  progress  upward  than  those  did  who 
seemed  to  be  thinking  solely  of  their  own  climbing  and 
comfort.  Those  who  forgot  self,  found  self  by  the  way, 
but  those  who  sought  it  lost  it. 

There  were  also  the  singing  and  rejoicing  Pilgrims  ;  but 
these  too  would  sometimes  be  brooding,  and  sometimes 
sympathizing ;  those  that  were  alio  ays  light-hearted  were 
apt  to  be  very  superficial ;  and  indeed,  unless  they  had 
sometimes  gone  down  into  the  depths  of  a  gloomy  experi- 
ence themselves,  they  could  not  tell  what  to  make  of  it  in 
others.  But  when  the  Pilgrims  were  in  those  depths,  it 
was  a  pretty  hard  thing  to  sing  ;  the  utmost  they  could  do 
sometimes,  was  to  groan  and  pray.  They  had  many 
sweet  melodies,  which,  when  I  heard,  I  wondered  that  any 


18  THE    HILL    DIFFICULTY. 

who  had  been  taught  of  God  with  a  heart-relish  for  those 
celestial  songs  and  harmonies,  should  ever  experience  such 
an  *'  itching  ear,"  as  some  among  them  did,  for  the  more 
fashionable  music  of  the  plains  below.  Here  and  there 
from  out  the  craggy  passes  of  the  Hill,  you  could  some- 
times hear  strains  like  the  following  from  a  little  band  of 
Pilgrims,  all  singing : 

On  wings  of  faith  ascending,  we  see  the  land  of  light, 
And  feel  our  sorrows  ending,  in  infinite  delight. 
'Tis  true  we  are  but  strangers,  and  pilgrims  here  below, 
And  countless  snares  and  dangers  surround  the  path  we  go. 
Though  painful  and  distressing,  yet  there  's  a  rest  above, 
And  onward  still  we  're  pressing,  to  reach  that  land  of  love. 

Sometimes  one  choir  of  Pilgrims  would  stand  and  sing 
as  follows : 

Long  nights  and  darkness  dwell  below, 

With  scarce  a  twinkling  ray. 
But  the  bright  world  to  which  we  go 

Is  everlasting  day. 
Our  journey  is  a  thorny  maze, 

But  we  march  upward  still. 
Forget  these  troubles  of  the  ways, 

And  reach  at  Zion's  Hill. 

Then  another  choir  would  take  up  the  strain,  higher  up 
above,  answering  and  echoing  : 

See  the  kind  angels  at  the  gates 

Inviting  us  to  come  ! 
There  Jesus,  the  Forerunner,  waits, 

To  welcome  travellers  home. 
There  on  a  green  and  flowery  mount 

Our  weary  souls  shall  sit 
And  with  transporting  joys  recount 

The  labors  of  our  feet. 

Then   both  choirs  together  would  break  out  in  chorus 
with  the  close  of  the  melody  : 

Eternal  gloty  to  the  King 

Who  brought  us  safely  through ! 
Our  tongues  shall  never  cease  to  sing 

And  endless  praise  renew. 


THE    HILL    DIFFICULTY.  19 

The  effect  was  enchanting,  sometimes,  of  a  bright  still 
night,  to  hear  these  melodies  echoing  from  point  to  point, 
among  the  windings  of  the  way  ;  and  it  seemed  as  if  you 
could  see  the  wings  of  listening  angels  in  the  moonlight. 

I  observed  that  there  was  great  need  of  watchfulness  in 
going  up  the  Hill,  because  there  were  so  many  ways  that 
wound  round  it,  instead  of  going  straight  up,  as  did  the 
King's  highway  ;  and  these  by-ways  went  off  sometimes  so 
gradually  from  the  straight  way,  that  a  careless  soul  might 
easily  be  decoyed  into  them  without  being  at  first  aware. 
There  was  one  path  especially,  that  was  exceedingly  de- 
ceitful and  dangerous,  which  was  called  Spiritual  Pride  by 
those  who  knew  its  character,  though  that  was  not  the 
name  given  to  it  generally,  which,  however,  was  of  such  a 
nature,  that  the  fastest  climbers,  when  they  fell  to  thinking 
complacently  about  their  progress,  instead  of  looking  and 
pressing  on  above,  were  most  in  danger  of  being  turned 
aside  in  it.  There  was  great  need  of  watchfulness,  to  pre- 
serve humility,  and  have  the  soul  kept  from  many  snares 
that  were  laid  for  the  feet  of  the  unwary. 

There  was  another  corresponding  by-path,  but  quite  on 
the  other  side  of  the  way,  called  Sacred  Formalism,  a  road 
that  wound  like  a  corkscrew,  with  chapels  every  few  steps, 
and  things  called  altars  between,  and  crosses  at  every 
corner,  and  in  fine,  so  many  sensible  objects,  and  prescribed 
devotions,  that  the  attention  of  the  souls  of  the  Pilgrims 
who  ran  into  that  way  was  quite  turned  from  that  which 
is  within  to  that  which  is  without.  They  looked  away 
from  the  end  of  the  Hill,  and  from  their  progress  upwards, 
to  this  corkscrew  of  things  done  daily,  in  which  many 
rested,  just  as  if  it  supplied  the  place  of  salvation,  or  as  if 
salvation  consisted  in  it.  When  this  was  the  case,  those 
who  were  thus  deluded  were  kept  all  their  life  going  round 
and  round,  always  working,  but  never  getting  a  step  up- 
wards, and  yet  always  imagining  themselves,  if  not  at  the 


20  THE    HILL    DIFFICULTY. 

very  top  of  the  hill,  yet  close  upon  it,  and  in  the  only  sure 
way  to  reach  it.     This  was  a  very  terrible  delusion. 

I  observed  that  the  only  safe  way,  the  only  security 
against  being  turned  aside  into  any  of  these  by-paths,  was 
in  a  watchful  keeping  as  near  as  possible  to  the  very 
middle  of  the  King's  highway.  It  was  said  that  the  turn- 
ing away  of  the  simple  should  slay  them,  but  that  God 
would  instruct  and  teach  in  his  own  way,  and  guide  with 
his  own  eye  those  who  trusted  in  him,  and  that  those  whom 
God  taught  the  way  of  his  statutes,  would  keep  it  unto  the 
end.  It  was  said  for  the  encouragement  of  the  Pilgrims  that 
God  was  good  and  upright,  and  therefore  would  certainly 
teach  sinners  in  the  way,  that  he  would  guide  the  meek  in 
their  judgment,  and  teach  the  meek  his  way,  and  that  all 
the  paths  of  the  Lord  were  mercy  and  truth  to  such  as  kept 
his  commandments  and  his  testimonies.  So  for  this  pur- 
pose a  great  many  good  prayers  were  put  into  their  lips, 
prayers  that  came  from  David's  heart  by  the  guidance  of 
God's  Spirit  when  he  was  on  the  Hill  and  exposed  to 
danger;  prayers  and  promises  together,  as  in  the  25th 
Psalm,  and  that  great  prayer  in  the  139th.  "  Search  me 
O  God,  and  know  my  heart ;  try  me,  and  know  my 
thoughts ;  and  see  if  there  be  any  wicked  way  in  me,  and 
lead  me  in  the  way  everlasting."  The  Pilgrims  were 
made  to  know,  that  if  there  were  any  wicked  way  in 
them,  it  was  not  possible  they  should  go  on  straight  in  God's 
everlasting  way ;  so  daily  they  must  bring  their  hearts 
and  ways  to  God  to  be  corrected,  and  by  him  must  be 
kept  in  the  right  way. 

For  this  there  were  great  instructions  given,  and  a  perfect 
map  was  furnished  to  all  who  desired  it,  before  setting  out, 
in  which  all  the  dangers  of  the  way  were  put  down,  as 
well  as  an  exact  and  accurate  line  of  the  true  way,  and 
many  of  the  experiences  which  the  Pilgrims  in  it  would  be 
sure  to  encounter.  There  were  many  notes  from  David's 
experience,  in  regard  to  this  map,  and  also  respecting  the 


THE    HILL    DIFFICULTY.  21 

snares,  gins,  and  nets,  that  would  be  hidden,  set,  and 
spread  by  the  wayside  for  the  unwary.  One  of  David's 
notes  and  prayers  together  was  as  follows:  "Concerning 
the  works  of  men,  by  the  word  of  thy  lips  I  have  kept  me 
from  the  paths  of  the  destroyer.  Hold  up  my  goings  in 
thy  paths,  that  my  footsteps  slip  not."  The  Pilgrims  were 
told  to  keep  these  instructions  and  this  map  in  the  very 
middle  of  their  hearts,  and  not  to  let  them  depart  from 
their  eyes ;  just  as  we  say  of  a  very  precious  thing  lent  to 
another,  Don't  let  it  go  out  of  your  sight  at  all,  for  a 
moment.  It  was  added  to  this  as  follows  :  "  Let  thine 
eyes  look  straight  on,  and  let  thine  eyelids  look  straight 
before  thee.  Ponder  the  paths  of  thy  feet,  and  let  all  thy 
ways  be  established.  Turn  not  to  the  right  hand  nor  to 
the  left ;  remove  thy  foot  from  evil.  My  soul,  wait  thou 
only  upon  God,  for  my  expectation  is  from  him." 

There  was  another  by-way,  which  one  would  not  have 
expected  to  find  running  off  from  the  Hill,  the  by-way  of 
the  strange  woman.  It  was  sometimes  in  one  place,  some- 
times in  another,  and  therefore  the  more  dangerous, 
especially  in  the  twilight,  in  the  evening,  and  in  the  black 
and  dark  night.  Her  ways  had  been  described  in  the  map 
before  spoken  of,  as  moveable  ways,  made  such  by  the 
woman,  that  men  might  not  know  them,  lest  they  should 
ponder  the  path  of  life.  This  danger  had  therefore  been 
put  down  in  the  map  more  clearly  than  most  others ;  and* 
it  was  said  concerning  that  same  strange  woman — "Re- 
move thy  way  far  from  her,  and  come  not  nigh  the  door  of 
her  house.  Her  feet  go  down  to  death,  her  steps  take  hold 
on  hell."  The  moveableness  and  swiftness  of  this  way  of 
sin  and  danger,  and  its  temptations  coming  sometimes  so 
unexpectedly,  was  one  cause  of  King  David  himself  being 
once  snared  by  it,  to  his  own  dreadful  guilt,  distress,  and 
almost  ruin.  He  would  have  been  destroyed  by  it,  but 
for  the  wonderful  mercy  of  God,  who  sent  after  him,  and 
brought  him  back.     Every  Pilgrim  on  the  Hill  knew  what 


22  THE    HILL    DIFFICULTY. 

had  happened  to  David,  and  also  to  Solomon  after  him ;  so 
that,  while  there  was  more  warning  on  the  Hill  against 
this  evil  than  when  David  and  Solomon  were  climbing  up, 
there  was  also  less  excuse  for  those  who  gave  way  to  it, 
for  they  did  it  against  great  light  and  knowledge.  And 
there  was,  moreover,  an  inscription  always  flaming  out  in 
the  sight  of  those  who  by  God's  grace  had  preserved  their 
souls  in  much  prayer  and  watchfulness,  when  they  came 
near  those  places  of  danger ;  a  very  solemn,  awful,  and 
forbidding  inscription,  in  letters  of  such  fiery,  angry  flame, 
and  yet  mournful  withal,  that  it  made  the  blood  curdle : 
"  He  knoweth  not  that  the  dead  are  there,  and  that  her 

GUESTS  ARE  IN  THE  DEPTHS  OF  HELL." 

All  these  by-ways  ran  in  the  enemy's  country,  a  country 
full  of  all  manner  of  evils  and  deaths.  The  paths  that 
struck  off"  into  it  were  strewn  with  the  skeletons  of  Pil- 
grims who  had  fallen  there,  and  remained  unburied.  For 
it  was  well  known  as  one  of  the  laws  of  the  Lord  of  the 
Hill,  that  "the  man  that  wandereth  out  of  the  way  of 
understanding  shall  remain  in  the  congregation  of  the 
dead."  And  the  congregation  of  unburied  dead  in  the 
enemy's  country  was  a  terrible  thing  to  witness.  It  had 
been  said  also,  that  there  was  no  hope  for  those  who  left 
the  paths  of  uprightness  to  walk  in  the  way  of  darkness, 
whose  ways  are  crooked,  and  they  froward  in  their  paths. 
In  connection  with  this,  the  pilgrims  were  cautioned 
against  leaning  to  their  own  understanding,  and  were  told 
that  the  way  of  the  wicked  is  as  darkness,  and  that  they 
know  not  at  what  they  stumble.  To  all  this  it  was  added 
with  great  emphasis  that  '''•  there  is  a  way  which  seemeth 
right  unto  a  man,  but  the  end  thereof  are  the  ways  of 
deathP 

A  good  reason  for  these  great  and  solemn  warnings, 
especially  the  last,  and  a  deep  meaning  in  them,  could  be 
seen  in  the  course  of  some  who  turned  out  of  the  way  at 
those  goings  off,  by  spiritual  pride  and  imaginary  perfection. 


THE    HILL    DIFFICULTY.  23 

It  had  been  generally  supposed  that  the  house  of  that 
strange  woman,  whose  house  is  the  way  to  hell,  going 
down  to  the  chambers  of  death,  was  almost  only  in  the 
plains  below.  But  it  was  found  that  one  of  her  "  move- 
able" dwellings  was  also  in  those  by-paths  going  off  from 
the  Hill,  full  of  pretensions  to  holiness,  to  call  passengers 
who  go  right  on  their  ways.  There  was  a  pretence  to  a 
holiness  so  great  and  marvellous,  that  it  released  men  en- 
tirely from  the  law  of  God,  and  set  them  free  from  all 
obligations,  and  that^  they  said,  was  the  freedom  of  faith. 
Many  unstable  souls  were  beguiled  by  the  accursed  prac- 
tices of  these  teachers,  and  went  into  the  house  of  the 
moveable  woman.  But  the  pilgrims  could  turn  to  their 
maps,  and  find  this  horrible  reef  of  sin  and  danger,  laid 
down  most  distinctly,  in  Peter,  with  the  very  beginnings 
of  it  in  those  boastful  pretences  of  great  holiness  and  free- 
dom. *'  For  when  they  speak  great  swelling  words  of 
vanity,  they  allure,  through  the  lusts  of  the  flesh,  through 
much  wantonness,  those  that  were  clean  escaped  from 
them  who  live  in  error.  While  they  promise  them  liberty, 
they  themselves  are  the  servants  of  corruption  :  for  of  whom 
a  man  is  overcome,  of  the  same  is  he  brought  in  bondage. 
For  if,  after  they  have  escaped  the  pollutions  of  the  world, 
through  the  knowledge  of  the  Lord  and  Saviour  Jesus 
Christ,  they  are  again  entangled  therein,  and  overcome,  the 
latter  end  is  worse  with  them  than  the  beginning.  For  it 
had  been  better  for  them  not  to  have  known  the  way  of 
righteousness,  than,  after  they  have  known  it,  to  turn  from 
the  holy  commandment  delivered  unto  them." 

Some  of  the  by-ways  of  this  Hill  were  much  frequented 
by  demons.  They  staid,  it  is  true,  mostly  in  the  plains 
below,  where  they  electioneered  for  the  owners  of  the  bal- 
loons, when  they  could  not  prevent  people  from  starting, 
at  some  rate,  on  the  journey  ;  but  still  they  came  some- 
times, in  great  swarms,  higher  up,  and  set  upon  the  pas- 
sengers up  the  Hill,  for  the  purpose  of  sifting  them,  and 


24  THE    HILL    DIFFICULTY. 

finding  weak  spots  where  they  might  strike  a  dart  through 
them.  Peter,  in  his  way  up  the  Hill,  encountered  such  an 
assault  more  than  once,  and  it  proved  a  perilous  place  in 
his  pilgrimage  ;  but  our  blessed  Lord  prayed  for  him,  and 
so  his  faith  was  not  suffered  utterly  to  fail.  Job,  it  was 
well  known,  had  terrible  and  repeated  encounters  of  this 
kind,  in  the  hardest  part  of  his  progress  up  the  Hill,  and 
Paul  once  and  again  was  hindered  in  his  way  by  Satan, 
and  spoke  from  experience  when  he  exhorted  all  Pilgrims 
to  put  on  the  whole  armor  of  God,  that  they  might  be  able 
to  stand  against  all  the  wiles  of  the  devil,  and  especially  to 
take  the  shield  of  faith  for  quenching  the  fiery  darts  of  the 
Wicked  One.  These  darts  the  Adversary  would  sometimes 
shoot,  suddenly  and  unexpectedly,  from  behind  the  crags 
that  outjutted  in  some  places  over  the  way,  and  Pilgrims 
who  walked  carelessly  received  many  a  severe  wound  and 
injury. 

Now,  when  I  had  beheld  all  these  things,  and  for  the 
present  was  satisfied  with  looking,  I  bethought  me  that  I 
would  examine  those  Songs  of  Degrees,  or  goings  up,  in 
the  Psalms  of  David,  for  I  thought  it  probable  he  might 
have  composed  them  on  purpose  for  the  pilgrimage  up  this 
very  Hill.  There  are  fifteen  of  them,  and  I  found  in  some 
of  them  very  great  internal  marks  of  the  Hill  Difficulty. 
In  the  ^st,  the  Pilgrim  seems  to  be  just  setting  out,  or 
thinking  of  setting  out  from  the  plains.  "  Wo  is  me,  that 
I  sojourn  in  Mesech,  that  I  dwell  in  the  tents  of  Kedar !" 

In  the  second,  he  has  a  clear  view  of  the  Hill,  and 
encourages  himself  greatly  with  God's  promises  in  setting 
out.  "  I  will  lift  up  mine  eyes  unto  the  hills.  My  help 
Cometh  from  the  Lord.  He  will  not  suffer  thy^  foot  to  be 
moved.  The  Lord  shall  preserve  thy  going  out  and  thy 
coming  in  forever." 

In  the  third,  he  rejoices  in  being  in  the  way  up  the  Hill, 
and  is  assured  that  he  shall  see  Jerusalem,  and  stand 
within  the  gates  of  the  great  city. 


THE    HILL    DIFFICULTY.  ^ 

In  the  fourth,  he  begins  to  meet  with  some  of  the  diffi- 
culties, but  lifts  up  his  soul  to  God,  and  waits  upon  him 
for  mercy  and  deliverance. 

In  the  fifth  he  has  evidently  had  some  wonderful  escapes 
from  the  dangers  of  the  way,  and  blesses  God  for  his 
deliverance. 

In  the  sixth  he  has  seen  the  fate  of  some  that  turn  aside, 
and  contrasts  it  with  the  happiness  of  those  who  trust  in 
the  Lord,  and  cannot  be  removed,  but  are  as  Mount  Zion, 
which  abideth  forever.  ''  As  for  such  as  turn  aside  into  their 
crooked  ways,  the  Lord  shall  lead  them  forth  with  the 
workers  of  iniquity,  but  peace  shall  be  upon  Israel." 

In  the  seventh,  eighth,  ninth,  and  tenth,  there  are  various 
and  beautifal  experiences,  some  of  them  applicable  espec- 
ially to  whole  households  on  pilgrimage. 

In  the  eleventh  there  is  a  great  and  precious  spiritual 
experience,  common  to  all  true  Pilgrims  up  the  Hill. 

In  the  twelfth  the  singer  seems  to  be  very  near  the  top, 
and  as  quiet  as  a  weaned  child.  And  that  was  David's 
quietism. 

In  the  thirteenth  he  has  great  foretastes  and  prophecies 
of  the  glorious  rest  of  God  forever. 

In  the  fourteenth  he  steps  into  the  winged  cars  with  a 
company  of  fellow-pilgrims,  and  enjoys  the  sweetness  of  the 
Christian  alliance,  the  unity  of  love. 

In  the  sixteenth  he  praises  God,  and  exhorts  to  the  ob- 
servance of  night,  as  well  as  day- worship  in  the  sanctuary, 
and  blesses  all  the  servants  of  the  Lord. 

The  Jewish  Rabbi,  Kimchi,  says  that  there  were  fifteen 
steps  by  which  the  priests  ascended  into  the  temple,  and 
on  each  of  these  steps  they  sang  one  of  these  psalms. 
This  was  all  the  approximation  that  many  of  them  ever 
made  towards  the  experience  of  a  Pilgrim's  Progress. 
Then  I  thought  that  those  who  now  go  back  to  Judaism, 
and  set  up  again  a  Jewish  priesthood  and  a  temple- worship 
.  in  the  place  of  Christ's  own  ministry  of  the  New  Dispensa- 

2 


26  THE    HILL    DIFFICULTY. 

tion,  are  likely  never  to  know  anything  more  of  the  Pil- 
grim's Progress  than  those  fifteen  stone  steps.  For  he 
only  is  a  true  descendant  of  faithful  Abraham  who  is  one 
inwardly,  and  circumcision  is  that  of  the  heart,  in  the 
spirit,  and  not  in  the  letter,  whose  praise  is  not  of  men, 
but  of  God.  The  Galatians,  in  the  time  of  Paul,  were 
going  up  those  stoae  steps ;  though  they  began  in  the 
spirit,  they  went  about  to  be  made  perfect  in  the  flesh  ; 
they  removed  from  the  grace  of  Christ  into  another  gospel 
of  forms  and  ordinances,  and  of  weak  and  beggarly  ele- 
ments, whereunto  they  desired  to  be  in  bondage.  But 
Paul  declared  that  in  Christ  Jesus  neither  circumcision 
availed  anything,  nor  uncircumcision,  but  faith  which 
worketh  by  love.  He  said  that  nothing  would  be  of  the 
least  avail  without  a  new  creature, — -the  entire  regeneration 
of  the  soul  in  Christ.  That  was  the  true  Pilgrim's  prog- 
ress ; — it  was  David's  Psalms  in  the  heart,  and  not  on  the 
fifteen  stone  steps  of  the  temple. 


THE  TWO  WAYS  AND  THE  TWO  ENDS. 

A    LIFE    ALLEGORY. 


Methought  I  was  writing  upon  the  mystery  of  the 
judgment.  The  books  seemed  as  if  open  before  me,  and 
my  pen  could  almost  transcribe  their  dread  immutable 
records.  But  I  was  looking  at  the  future  through  the  un- 
erring telescope  of  the  past ;  through  the  mighty  fact,  that 
all  of  life  is  to  be  reproduced  in  the  day  of  judgment,  and 
then  and  there  to  constitute  the  material  and  ground  of  an 
endless  and  immutable  decision.  In  this  connection  there 
came  to  my  mind  the  remark  of  an  eminent  man  of  God, 
Mr.  Cecil,  that  the  way  of  every  man  is  declarative  of  the 
end  of  that  man.  A  prayerful  man,  for  example,  I  said, 
will  have  a  prayerful  end.  A  prayerful  man,  a  man  whose 
life  has  been  ordered  by  prayer,  and  filled  with  the  habit 
of  prayer,  will  be  prayerful  in  sickness,  and  prayerful  in 
death.  He  will  possess  a  spirit  of  prayer,  even  when  all 
the  faculties  of  body  and  of  mind  seem  departing.  The 
habit  of  his  life  will  assert  its  power,  and  come  out  triumph- 
ant in  death,  and  there  will  be  communiDn  of  the  soul  with 
the  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  even  when  all  possibility  of  com- 
muning with  anything  of  earth  has  departed. 

I  remarked  that  a  man's  whole  way  through  life,  religious 
or  irreligious,  is  developed  at  his  end.  Our  life  is  as  a  book, 
in  the  leaves  of  which  are  written,  for  the  most  part,  as  with 
invisible  ink,  the  processes  of  our  real  existence,  the  goings 
on  of  our  inward,  hidden  being,  the  movements  of  real, 


28  THE    TWO    WAYS    AND    THE    TWO    ENDS. 

undissembled,  absolute  character  and  motive.  Our  appear- 
ance in  the  eye  of  men,  our  actions  with  the  world,  our  life, 
which  the  world  notices,  occupies  but  little  of  the  writing 
in  this  book.  By  far  the  greater  part  is  taken  up  with  the 
processes  of  a  life,  which  men  do  not,  and  cannot  see, 
which  God  only  sees  fully  and  clearly,  and  of  which  we 
ourselves  seldom  read  more  than  a  page  at  a  time. 

I  had  written  thus  far,  and  was  proceeding,  on  the  same 
train  of  thought,  to  show  that  every  development  of  our 
nature  and  habits,  every  thought,  wish,  plan,  feeling,  and 
action  of  life,  was  a  part  of  our  way  through  life,  prophesy- 
ing its  end,  and  destined  to  come  out  fully,  as  constituting 
our  character  and  determining  our  retribution  at  the  judg- 
ment. I  was  passing  on  thus  in  my  contemplations,  when 
suddenly  an  invisible  influence  changed  the  direction  of  my 
thoughts,  just  as  if  an  angel  should  stand  at  the  brake  of 
a  railroad,  where  two  trains  intersect,  and  by  an  unseen 
movement  of  the  lever  should  turn  the  cars  from  one  direc- 
tion to  another,  the  passengers  knowing  nothing  of  it.  Just 
so,  by  a  single  text  of  Scripture,  my  train  of  thought  was 
turned.  Whether  it  were  an  angel,  ministering,  that 
brought  me  the  passage,  or  what  unseen  association,  link- 
ing it  with  Mr.  Cecil's  remark,  I  know  not;  but  under  the 
guidance  of  my  invisible  conductor  I  passed  on.  The  text 
was  from  Proverbs,  the  fifteenth  chapter,  twenty-fourth 
verse  : — ^'  The  way  of  life  is  above  to  the  wise,  that  he  may 
depart  from  hell  beneath." 

Here,  said  my  invisible  conductor,  is  your  subject. 
Here  is  where  Mr.  Cecil's  remark  comes  from  God.  All 
mankind  are  travelling  in  one  of  these  two  ways,  and  the 
way  of  each  man  shows  plainly  what  his  end  will  be. 
There  is  a  way  above  and  a  way  beneath.  The  way  above 
is  spiritual,  prayerful,  a  way  of  faith  and  prayer.  The 
way  beneath  is  earthly,  worldly,  prayerless,  a  way  of  un- 
belief and  insensibility,  and  carelessness.  The  way  above 
is  the  way  of  a  few ;    the  way  beneath  is  the  way  of  a 


THE    TWO    WAYS    AND    THE    TWO    ENDS.       ^  29 

multitude.  The  way  above  leads  above,  leads  to  Heaven  ; 
the  way  beneath  leads  beneath,  leads  down  to  hell.  The 
way  above  is  the  way  of  the  wise ;  the  way  beneath  is  the 
way  of  fools. 

Now,  said  jny  invisible  conductor,  waving  this  text  be- 
fore me,  as  a  kind  of  fiery  banner,  let  us  leave  your  meta- 
physics, and  your  tracing  of  the  involutions  of  men's 
thoughts,  and  let  us  follow  their  w^ays,  these  two  ways, 
there  being  no  other  but  these  two,  out  of  this  world  into 
the  eternal  world  ;  the  way  above  and  the  way  beneath, 
the  way  to  heaven  and  the  way  to  hell.  For  this  is  just 
that  which  our  Saviour  said  as  plainly  in  other  words, 
Enter  ye  in  at  the  strait  gate ;  for  wide  is  the  gate,  and 
broad  is  the  way  that  leadeth  to  destruction,  and  many 
there  be  which  go  in  thereat.  Because  strait  is  the  gate, 
and  narrow  is  the  way  which  leadeth  unto  life,  and  few 
there  be  that  find  it. 

We  will  take  up  these  two  ways,  said  my  conductor, 
in  a  figure,  or  allegorical  description,  where  they  pass  into 
two  bridges,  across  the  probationary  tide  of  our  existence. 
Jf  you  wish  to  interrupt  me  in  the  narrative  with  questions, 
you  can  do  it;  but  I  shall  show  you  very  plainly  the 
course  of  this  world,  and  the  meaning  of  the  way  above 
and  the  way  beneath,  and  the  reason  and  truth  of  Mr. 
Cecil's  weighty  remark,  that  the  way  of  every  man  is 
declarative  of  the  end  of  that  man. 

The  first  of  our  two  Bridges  is  the  Bridge  of  Faith  and 
Prayer.  We  are  crossing  a  roaring  torrent.  The  passage 
is  full  of  danger,  for  the  surge  beneath  is  certain  destruc- 
tion to  those  who  fall  therein.  This  Bridge  of  Faith  and 
Prayer  is  the  only  safe  and  sure  way  across  it.  This 
Bridge  is  narrow,  although  it  is  perfectly  safe,  and  it  is 
found  abundantly  wide  enough  for  all  who  will  enter  upon 
it.  In  some  places,  indeed,  it  seems  almost  like  a  line,  and 
from  the  shore  it  is  never  visible  far,  except  that  the 
entrance  upon  it  is  very  plain  and.  positiyej  and  not  to  bQ 


80  THE    TWO    WAYS    AND    THE    TWO    ENDS. 

mistaken.  Sometimes,  even  to  those  who  have  entered 
upon  it,  it  is  ahuost  imperceptible,  except  from  step  to  step, 
except  as  the  soul  goes  on,  trusting.  But  always,  if  the 
soul  will  take  one  step,  it  shall  see  the  next ;  and  if  the 
soul  run  ever  so  fast,  step  after  step  instantly  becomes 
visible.  The  traveller  can  never  out-run  faith,  so  as  to 
walk  without  it,  but  there  is  always  firm  footing  found, 
even  though  sometimes  when  the  foot  was  lifted  to  go  on 
there  seemed  at  first  nothing  but  air  for  it  to  tread  in. 

Here  I  interrupted  my  conductor,  and  said  to  him.  Your 
description  reminds  me  of  that  passage  in  David,  My  soul 
followeth  hard  after  Thee  ;  thy  riglit  hand  npholdeth  me. 
I  suppose  the  right  hand  of  the  Lord  often  upheld  David 
in  crossing  this  bridge,  when  both  hand  and  bridge  were 
almost,  if  not  quite,  invisible.  Indeed,  said  my  conductor, 
the  supports  of  the  Lord  are  much  oftener  invisible  than 
visible ;  if  they  were  not,  if  we  could  always  see  the  Lord 
beside  us,  and  feel,  as  with  sensible  evidence,  his  hand  hold- 
ing ours,  where  were  our  faith,  or  the  need  of  it,  or  the 
discipline  of  it?  But  this  narrow  bridge  is  a  bridge  of 
faith  and  prayer.  And  whereas  I  said  it  could  be  seen 
from  the  shore  but  a  little  way  out,  this  is  because  the  life 
of  every  saint  is  a  life  hid  with  Christ  in  God  ;  and  though 
it  will  be  proved  by  its  fruits  of  holiness,  and  is  marked  by 
a  plain  profession  at  the  enterance,  yet  the  secret  source 
of  it  is  not  visible  to  the  world  and  never  can  be  ;  neither 
can  the  daily  secret  course  of  it  be  visible,  no  otherwise 
than  as  a  hidden  stream  is  visible  by  the  greenness  and 
beauty  of  its  banks. 

It  is  the  Bridge  of  Faith  and  Prayer.  A  prayerful  soul 
is  ahvays  prayerful,  but  only  because  at  particular  and 
proper  times  it  does  nothing  else  but  pray.  Now  this 
Bridge,  though  so  narrow,  and  often  so  like  a  line  in  the 
air,  is  supported  by  strong  piers  from  interval  to  interval, 
with  places  of  refuge  upon  them,  where  the  soul  may  stop 
for  a  season  in  safety,  and  take  breath,  and  gather  strength 


THE    TWO    WAYS    AND    THE    TWO    ENDS.  31 

and  wisdom  to  go  over  the  next  interval,  trusting  in  God, 
These  piers  and  refuges  are  places  of  prayer  and  seasons 
of  prayer,  in  which  the  soul  that  is  crossing  often  feels  as 
if  it  would  like  to  stay  for  days  and  weeks  and  months 
together,  and  never  be  obliged  to  step  forth  from  them  to 
trace  the  difficult  and  dangerous  line  of  the  passage.  And 
this  is  a  good  feeling,  as  a  foretaste  of  that  rest  which 
remaineth  for  the  people  of  God,  when  prayers,  and  toils, 
and  dangers  shall  be  ended.  But  it  is  not  a  good  feeling, 
if  it  keeps  the  soul  back  from  duty.  It  was  a  good  feeling 
which  prompted  Peter  to  say.  If  thou  wilt,  let  us  build 
here  three  tabernacles ;  and  there  Peter  would  have  loved 
to  dwell  with  those  radiant  forms  forever  ;  but  it  was  not 
a  good  feeling  when  it  made  Peter  forget  a  world  lying  in 
wickedness,  and  when  it  permitted  Peter  to  tempt  our 
blessed  Lord  away  from  his  path  of  suffering  unto  death. 
So  it  is  good  for  the  soul  to  love  its  safe  resting  and  sweet 
nestling,  as  a  bird,  in  God ;  but  it  may  possibly  love  to 
abide  with  God  in  such  a  way  of  sensible  comfort  as  to  be 
kept  from  pursuing  the  path  that  leads  to  God. 

These  places  of  rest  in  this  world  are  like  Christian's 
Arbor  amid  the  Hill  Difficulty ;  we  cannot  abide  in  them, 
for  the  refuges  of  prayer  were  not  built  for  our  indolent 
abode,  or  for  our  heaven  upon  earth,  but  as  places  where 
we  may  gain  glimpses  of  heaven  to  encourage  us  onward, 
and  strength  for  duty  while  advancing.  So  on  we  must 
go,  tracing  the  next  interval,  there  being  no  rest  but 
beyond  the  roaring  torrent,  in  those  sweet  fields,  drest  in 
living  green,  where  everlasting  spring  abides,  and  never 
withering  flowers.  There  we  may  rest ;  but  while  cross- 
ing the  tempestuous  flood  of  life,  we  may  not  stay,  even 
in  the  place  of  prayer,  longer  than  to  get  strength  for  the 
next  interval  of  duty.  And  so  the  soul  must  go  carefully, 
watchfully,  from  prayer  to  prayer ;  and  doing  this,  the 
spirit  of  prayer  will  be  increasing  continually. 

There  are  some  parts  of  this  Bridge  commanded  or  over- 


32  THE    TWO    WAYS    AND    THE    TWO    ENDS. 

looked  more  advantageously  than  others  by  the  great 
adversary  of  souls,  the  god  of  this  world,  where  sometimes 
the  fiery  flaming  darts  of  him  and  his  crew  come  flying 
in  upon  the  Pilgrim  in  such  sort,  that  even  with  the  shield 
of  faith  he  has  much  ado  to  quench  them.  Here  he  has 
to  fly  as  nimbly  and  swiftly  as  possible  from  refuge  to 
refuge,  from  prayer  to  prayer,  and  perhaps  to  be  a  long 
Awhile  praying  and  a  little  while  crossing,  prayer  itself  being 
possibly  his  main  duty.  And  indeed  the  place  of  prayer, 
when  the  soul  is  truly  laboring  there  and  fervent,  is  always 
the  place  of  safety ;  and  the  difficulty  with  most  Pilgrims 
is,  that  that  they  do  not  spend  time  enough  in  it,  hurrying 
in  and  out  confusedly,  sometimes  stopping  where  they 
should  not,  and  sometimes  not  abiding  where  they  should, 
and  so  giving  Satan  an  advantage.  It  is  a  great  thing  to 
know  how  to  use  the  weapon  of  All-prayer  in  this  pilgrimage, 
and  to  know  the  worth  and  power  of  it  from  experience. 

As  to  the  narrowness  of  this  Bridge,  it  seems  beforehand 
much  narrower  than  afterwards  it  is  fonnd  to  be,  when 
once  there  is  faith  enough  to  start  upon  it.  Some  have 
been  so  greatly  terrified  and  deterred  by  the  straitness  of 
it,  as  to  say  beforehand  that  they  never  shall  be  able  to 
travel  in  such  a  way,  and  so  they  never  set  out ;  but  the 
reason  why  it  seems  too  narrow  is  because  their  own  souls 
are  so  wide  with  the  vanities  of  this  life,  wrapping  them 
up  and  hanging  about  them.  When  they  have  once  set 
out,  it  is  found  to  be  broad  enough,  not  because  it  is  not 
really  so  narrow  as  they  imagined,  but  because  their  own 
earthly  desires  and  views  are  narrowed,  while  their 
heavenly  ones  are  expanded.  Their  heavenly  desires  and 
wants  are  found  to  be  as  wings  at  their  shoulders,  lifting 
them  i7p.  so  that  a  mere  touch  of  the  foot  upon  the  earth 
is  enough  to  spring  them  forward  on  their  passage  ; 
whereas  their  earthly  desires,  if  encouraged  and  attended 
to,  make  their  feet  so  broad  and  heavy,  that  the  whole 
bridge  is  not  wide   enough  to  tread  upon.     And  indeed, 


THE    TWO    WAYS    AND    THE    TWO    ENDS.  33 

they  are  often  thus  so  burdened  that  they  cannot  lift  one 
foot  after  another. 

Let  the  soul  once  set  out  upon  this  Bridge,  truly, 
heartily,  and  it  becomes  wider,  easier,  more  secure,  at 
every  interval.  Gradually  the  piers  themselves  seem  to 
stretch  out,  enlarge,  and  come  nearer  to  one  another,  till 
at  length  they  fill  almost  the  whole  space,  and  become 
places  of  rest  while  the  soul  is  following  hard  after  God, 
and  even  while  it  feels  faint  in  pursuing.  The  soul  more 
and  more  clearly  and  delightedly  sees  the  foundations  of 
the  Bridge,  that  it  is  built  in  God ;  and  feels  its  stability, 
its  security,  its  certainty,  in  the  experience  and  increase 
of  that  faith,  which  is  the  substance  of  things  hoped  for, 
and  the  evidence  of  things  not  seen.  In  this  is  fulfilled  the 
declaration,  that  all  believers,  after  they  have  believed, 
are  sealed  with  that  holy  Spirit  of  promise,  which  is  the 
earnest  of  their  inheritance  until  the  redemption  of  their 
purchased  possession  in  Christ,  until  they  get  past  the 
Bridge  and  have  entered  into  heaven.  With  some,  this 
earnest  of  the  inheritance  beforehand  is  larger  and  richer, 
but  always  it  is  glorious. 

But  the  rest  or  refreshment  of  the  Christian  life  not 
being  the  object  for  which  this  Bridge  was  built,  neither  is 
that  the  object  of  the  soul  in  entering  upon  it.  Obedience 
to  God  is  the  great  business  of  the  Christian's  life,  and  if 
that  be  the  Christian's  anxiety,  peace  and  happiness  will 
follow  ;  but  whether  it  follow  or  not,  the  Christian's  duty 
is  the  same,  to  trust  God,  and  obey.  This  is  sweetly 
expressed  by  Baxter : 

•'  Lord  it  belongs  not  to  my  care 

Whether  1  die  or  live  ; 
To  love  and  serve  thee  is  my  share, 

And  this  thy  grace  must  give. 
If  life  be  long,  I  will  be  glad, 

That  I  may  long  obey ; 
If  short,  yet  why  should  I  be  sad,. 

That  shall  have  the  same  pay  1" 

2* 


34  THE    TWO    WAYS    AND    THE    TWO    ENDS. 

Now  in  proportion  as  duty  and  not  rest  becomes  the  great 
object  of  the  soul,  or  holy  usefulness  and  not  mere  enjoy- 
ment, in  that  proportion  there  will  be  rest  and  happiness ; 
rest  is  found  and  experienced  by  such  a  soul,  when  another 
soul,  that  is  seeking  very  anxiously  for  rest,  but  does  not 
think  so  much  of  duty,  misses  of  it.  They  that  seek  it  for 
itself  are  not  apt  to  find  it ;  while  they  who  seek  to  get 
forward  by  it,  who  seek  it  for  God,  and  seek  God  in  it, 
and  the  fulfilment  of  duty,  find  it  in  abundance. 

Moreover,  our  blessed  Lord  has  said.  Come  unto  me, 
and  I  will  give  you  rest ;  and  it  is  not  alone  in  heaven  that 
he  gives  it,  for  there  must  be  the  beginning  of  rest  in  him 
even  in  this  world,  or  there  can  be  no  such  thing  as  rest  in' 
heaven.  And  all  along  this  Bridge  of  Faith  and  Prayer  he 
has  provided  and  appointed  places  of  wonderful  refresh- 
ment, where  he  himself  comes  down  and  sits  with  the 
Pilgrims,  gathering  them  around  him,  and  giving  them 
bread  and  wine,  and  holding  interviews  with  them,  which 
are  a  stay  and  support  to  the  soul  through  all  the  journey. 
Yea,  in  the  strength  supplied  by  one  such  interview, 
rightly  used,  they  are  prepared  to  hasten  on  with  a  great 
and  happy  impulse.  And  their  hearts  often  burn  within 
them,  not  only  at  such  interviews,  but  while  they  remem- 
ber what  he  said,  and  how  he  walked  and  talked  with 
them,  and  expounded  unto  them  in  all  the  Scriptures,  the 
things  concerning  himself. 

The  Sabbaths,  as  God  has  appointed  them,  are  sweet 
refuges  and  refreshments  to  the  soul  upon  this  Bridge. 
Yea,  they  often  seem  as  if  they  were  the  very  days  of 
heaven — angels'  days  rather  than  man's — they  are  so 
heavenly  and  precious.  The  soul  may  have  been  travelling 
in  six  whole  days  of  rain,  but  in  these  Lord's  days  there 
always  will  be  seasons  of  fair  weather,  gleams  of  glory, 
and  bright  shadows  of  true  rest.  They  are  like  stars,  or 
shining  lustres,  hung  at  intervals  all  along  a  dark  way. 
The  soul  that  loves  them  and  marks  them,  walks  in  their 


THE    TWO    WAYS    AND    THE    TWO    ENDS.  35 

light  all  the  week,  and  measures  the  way  to  heaven  by 
them. 

This  Bridge  is  itself  a  path  of  light  from  beginning  to 
end,  although  sometimes,  as  we  have  said,  they  who  are 
travelling  on  it  can  see  only  the  next  step  before  them. 
But  this  is  not  any  fault  of  the  way,  but  generally  an  im- 
perfection of  faith ;  though  a  soul  trusting  in  God  will  be 
satisfied  and  happy  if  it  can  see  step  by  step  in  the  path  of 
duty,  even  if  all  around  it  there  seems  to  be  the  very 
Valley  of  the  Shadow  of  Death.  The  whole  span  of  the  , 
bridge  is  really  a  line  of  light  from  beginning  to  end ;  and 
sometimes,  in  favorable  weather,  the  soul  can  see  clear 
across  the  flood,  even  where  the  line  of  light  opens  into 
heaven.  Moreover,  to  those  who  are  travelling,  the  light 
is  constantly  increasing  ;  according  to  that  heavenly  law 
fixed  by  the  Maker  of  the  Bridge,  that  the  path  of  the  justy 
as  the  shining'  light,  shineth  more  and  more  unto  the  per- 
fect day.  Some  travellers,  contrary  to  this  law,  seem  to 
carry  a  cloud  with  them,  and  to  have  dark  and  stormy 
weather  almost  all  the  way ;  but  this  is  often  because  they 
look  into  their  own  hearts  for  light,  when  they  should  be 
looking  to  the  Saviour,  and  often  because  they  seek  more 
for  comfort  than  Christ,  but  still  oftener  because  they  loiter 
by  the  way,  and  look  behind  them,  at  the  things  that  are 
seen  instead  of  those  that  are  unseen.  It  is  exceedingly 
desirable,  and  it  is  always  a  duty,  for  children  of  the  light 
to  walk  in  the  light,  as  well  as  by  the  light,  and  to  enjoy 
it  within  themselves,  as  well  as  to  see  it  before  them. 
Moreover,  the  Maker  of  the  Bridge  has  himself  said,  I  am 
the  Way,  the  Truth,  the  Life.  He  that  followeth  me  shall 
not  walk  in  darkness,  but  shall  have  the  light  of  life.  That 
is  a  beautiful  expression — the  light  of  life;  it  signifies 
something  within,  as  well  as  without,  an  experience  of 
light,  as  well  as  a  sight  of  it,  a  living  as  well  as  a  shining 
light.     So  in  this   experience,   "  unto   the   upright  there 


36  THE    TWO    WAYS    AND    THE    TWO    ENDS. 

ariseth  a  light  in  the  darkness,"  light  within ,  even  when  it 
is  dark  without.     So  the  Pilgrim  may  go  on  singing  : — 

My  soul,  there  is  a  Country 

Afar  beyond  the  stars.  ^fHH''^  ' 

Where  stands  a  winged  sentry,         ^  " 

All  skilful  in  the  wars. 
There  above  noise  and  danger 

Sweet  peace  is  crowned  with  smiles, 
And  One  born  in  a  manger 
Commands  the  beauteous  files. 
He  is  thy  gracious  friend, 

And  (O  my  soul,  awake  !) 
Did  in  pure  love  descend, 
To  die  here  for  thy  sake. 

If  thou  canst  but  get  thither, 

There  grows  the  flower  of  peace. 
The  Rose  that  cannot  wither, 

Thy  fortress  and  thine  ease. 
Leave  then  thy  foolish  ranges, 

For  none  can  thee  secure 
But  One,  who  never  changes, 

Thy  God,  thy  Life,  thy  Cure. 

Hknry  Vaughan, 


FEW    THERE    BE    THAT    FIND    IT. 

Now  notwithstanding  all  this,  said  my  Condnctor,  there 
are  very  few  Pilgrims  seen  upon  this  first  bridge,  in  com- 
parison with  the  vast  multitudes  who  have  to  cross  the 
torrent.  And  it  is  because  the  Maker  and  Owner  of  that 
Bridge  has  put  down  the  law  also  at  its  entrance :  If  any 
man  will  come  after  me,  let  him  deny  himself,  take  up  his 
cross  daily,  and  follow  me.  There  are  many  who  would 
like  the  Life  Everlasting,  to  which  this  Bridge  is  the  only 
way,  if  they  could  have  it  without  the  self-denial,  and  the 
cross  daily.  And  so  the  Lord  of  the  Bridge  has  said,  Ye 
will  not  come  unto  me  that  ye  might  have  life.  For  strait 
is  the  gate,  and  narrow  is  the  way  that  leadeth  unto  life, 
and  few  there  be  that  find  it.     But  wide  is  the  gate,  and 


THE    TWO    WAYS    AND    THE    TWO    ENDS.  37 

broad  is  the  way  that  leadeth  to  destruction,  and  many- 
there  be  who  go  in  thereat.  If  they  would  come  to  Christ 
at  the  outset,  they  would  find  the  first  way,  though  narrow 
and  strait,  easy  and  pleasant ;  for  Christ's  grace  would 
make  it  pleasant,  and  no  man  would  have  to  travel  it  alone, 
depending  on  himself,  but  with  Christ  in  company,  casting 
all  care  on  him,  and  receiving  grace  and  strength  from  him 
daily.  But  they  neglect  Christ ;  they  go  wrong  at  the 
very  beginning,  and  the  very  beginning  seems  gloomy  and 
difficult,  because  they  are  without  Christ,  and  will  not 
come  to  him.  The  very  beginning  of  crossing  this  Bridge 
of  life  and  happiness  must  be  this  very  coming  to  Christ, 
and  then  every  step  of  the  way  leads  upwards,  and  is 
under  his  light,  his  guidance,  his  comfort.  The  way  of 
life  is  above  to  the  wise,  that  he  may  depart  from  hell 
beneath. 


MANY  THERE  BE  THAT  GO  IN  THEREAT. 

There  is  another  Bridge  below  this,  broad,  easy,  in- 
offensive to  the  natural  man,  apparently  safe,  built  by  the 
god  of  this  world,  crowded  with  thousands  upon  thousands. 
Those  who  enter  upon  it  walk  not  by  faith,  but  sense,  and 
nevertheless,  can  see  but  a  step  or  two  beyond  them,  and 
moreover  are  too  busy  with  themselves  and  one  another  to 
notice  the  condition  of  the  Bridge,  which,  after  those  in  it 
have  gone  too  far  to  get  back,  and  even  before,  is  full  of 
dangerous  holes  and  pitfalls,  through  which  multitudes 
are  constantly  dropping  out  of  the  throng,  and  disappearing 
in  the  roaring  surge  below.  Nevertheless,  the  throng  rolls 
on,  heedless,  insensible,  expecting  to  reach  the  land,  but 
destined  all  to  plunge  into  the  billows.  For  this  Bridge 
has  no  landing-place,  but  terminates  abruptly,  far  out  in 
the  very  depths  of  the  flood,  broken  off  suddenly ;  so  that 
the  unsuspecting  throng,  just  as  fast  as  they  come  up  to 


9    up   1 


38  THE    TWO    WAYS    AND    THE    TWO    ENDS. 

that  point,  are  pushed  off  without  possibility  of  recovery, 
the  crowding  multitude  behind  always  crowding  on,  insen- 
sible, and  not  knowing  what  is  incessantly  happening  to 
those  before.  Sometimes  a  dismal  shriek  rises  from  those 
who  discover  the  dreadful  termination  a  little  before  their 
feet  slide,  but  it  is  too  late;  you  hear  the  shriek,  the 
plunge,  and  all  is  over.  Still  the  crowd  roll  on,  generation 
after  generation ;  whole  families,  and  almost  unbroken 
communities  are  seen  together  ;  on,  on,  on  roars  the  tide 
below,  on,  on,  on,  never  ceasing,  pours  the  living  tide  above, 
till  down  it  plunges,  in  a  fall  more  resistless  than  the 
cataract,  surge  after  surge  rolling  to  destruction. 

But,  said  I  to  my  Conductor,  how  is  it  possible  that  all 
this  ruin  should  go  on  and  the  multitude  not  know  it,  and 
so  turn  back,  or  refrain  from  a  way  that  leads  to  certain 
perdition  ?  Alas !  replied  he,  they  do  know  it,  but  in 
every  individual  case  do  not  believe  it  in  regard  to  them- 
selves, or  else  persuade  themselves  that  they  shall  escape 
and  come  off  safely,  where  the  whole  multitude  otherwise 
perish.  Besides,  the  infatuation  of  men  thus  hurrying, 
excited,  in  the  Broad  Way,  has  something  of  insanity  in  it ; 
for  all  men  think  all  men  mortal  but  themselves  ;  and 
though  Death  is  among  them  on  the  Bridge,  striking  this 
way  and  that ;  and  though  they  are  told  beforehand  of  the 
awful  termination  of  the  way,  and  how  the  Bridge  was  put 
up  by  the  god  of  this  world  purposely  for  man's  ruin,  yet 
this  makes  no  difference  in  their  career.  As  fast  as  one 
drops  through  the  Bridge,  another  steps  into  his  place,  and 
for  those  who  get  to  the  termination,  not  having  dropped 
through  by  the  way,  there  is  no  possibility  of  return  ;  they 
are  brought  into  desolation  as  in  a  moment,  they  are  utterly 
consumed  with  terrors,  and  their  fall  is  without  remedy, 
irrecoverable,  final,  in  the  overwhelming  suddenness  and 
anguish  of  despair. 

At  the  entrance  to  this  Bridge  there  is  no  want  of  signs 
and  warnings,  instructions  written  and  spoken,  and  some- 


THE    TWO    WAYS    AND    THE    TWO    ENDS.  39 

times  in  a  voice,  the  thunder  of  which  may  be  heard  even 
from  the  upper  Bridge  to  the  lower,  and  from  one  end  of 
the  Bridge  to  the  other.  There  is  that  great  warning  in 
bright  characters,  The  way  of  life  is  above  to  the  wise, 
THAT  he  may  depart  FROM  HELL  BENEATH.  And  you  may 
both  hear  and  read  the  great  proclamation.  Turn  ye,  turn 
YE,  FOR  WHY  AviLL  YE  DIE  !  And  there  are  sign-posts  and 
messengers  pointing  direct  to  the  upper  Bridge,  and  show- 
ing the  way,  and  entreating  the  multitudes  to  walk  in  it. 
Nevertheless,  almost  all  pass  on  in  the  broad,  beaten,  lower 
way,  though  some  few,  even  after  entering  upon  it,  turn 
back,  and  with  great  effort,  regain  the  way  that  leads  to 
the  narrow  Bridge  above.  For  even  upon  the  turnpike  of 
the  god  of  this  world  the  Lord  of  the  upper  Bridge  has 
stationed  his  messengers  to  warn  those  who  will  listen,  and 
to  tell  them  of  their  sure  destruction  if  they  go  on.  There 
is  no  want  of  the  plainest,  most  explicit  warning. 

Sometimes  these  faithful  messengers  have  been  thrust 
down,  trampled  on,  and  killed,  in  their  work  of  mercy ; 
and  often  they  have  found  it  a  desperate  conflict  to  beat 
back  the  surge  of  ruin,  and  to  regain,  for  those  who  listen 
to  them,  a  footing  once  more  of  safety.  But  still  they 
warn,  they  expostulate,  they  shout ;  and  sometimes  a  tone 
of  startling  power  may  be  heard  ringing  through  the  whole 
distance  of  the  Bridge,  Back  !  put  back,  for  your  life  ! 
Flee  from  the  wrath  to  come  !  But,  alas,  the  living  tide 
rolls  on,  unimpeded,  and  if  one  undertakes  to  stem  it,  he  is 
almost  borne  down,  and  some  look  on  him  as  out  of  his 
senses,  and  some  salute  him  with  shouts  of  ridicule, 
although  some  others  regard  him  with  seriousness,  and 
seem  to  wish  him  well ;  and  some  there  are  who  wish  also 
that  they  too  had  resolution  enough  to  turn  back  with  him. 
Blessed  is  the  man  who  finds  his  way  back,  and  takes  the 
upper  Bridge,  trusting  in  God  for  mercy. 

To  make  this  easier,  if  a  man  will  but  turn,  there  are 
side  landing-places  and  stair-ways,  through  which  one  may 


40  THE    TAVO    WAYS    AND    THE    TWO    ENDS. 

rise  out  from  among  the  crowd,  and  find  a  footing  back, 
even  on  the  outside  of  the  Bridge  ;  and  over  these  places 
is  also  posted  the  warning,  The  way  of  life  is  above  to 

THE  WISE,  THAT  HE  MAY  DEPART  FROM  HELL  BENEATH.   And 

on  the  Sabbath  days  especially,  men  stand  with  the  Book 
of  Life  in  their  hands,  beseeching  the  multitude  to  stop  in 
their  career  and  turn  back.  And  sometimes  you  may  see 
large  collections  of  people  stopping  and  listening,  quietly, 
and  even  solemnly  ;  but  on  Monday  morning  you  will  see 
nearly  the  whole  of  them  hurrying  on  again  as  madly  as 
ever  with  the  crowd,  and  forgetful  of  all  they  heard  and 
saw  upon  the  Sabbath. 

This  Bridge  of  Death  is  a  covered  bridge,  covered  over 
so  as  to  exclude  the  light  from  Heaven,  but  filled  with 
dancing,  glaring  lights,  and  at  the  sides  built  up  with 
booths  and  shops,  theatres  and  operas.  In  these  places  of 
refreshment  and  amusement,  put  up  by  the  god  of  this 
world,  the  tide  throng  in  and  out,  revelling  as  they  go  ; 
they  have  music  and  dancing,  eating  and  drinking,  and 
ten  thousand  forms  and  expedients  of  gayety  and  pleasure. 
The  apostle  Peter  spake  of  these  things  in  his  time,  when 
he  said  that  the  years  past  of  our  life  "  may  sutlice  us  to 
have  wrought  the  will  of  the  Gentiles,  when  we  walked  in 
lasciviousness,  lusts,  excess  of  wine,  revellings,  banquet- 
ings,  and  abominable  idolatries.  Wherein  they  think  it 
strange  that  ye  run  not  with  them  to  the  same  excess  of 
riot,  speaking  evil  of  you."  Men  are  insensible  of  the 
flight  of  time  amidst  these  absorbing  pleasures  and  occu- 
pations, and  not  only  often  forget  their  mortality,  but  act 
as  if  they  disbelieved  it — as  if  they  were  to  stay  in  their 
places  of  pleasure  and  business  forever.  But  what  is 
singular,  and  to  a  reflecting  observer  a  very  solemn  pecu- 
liarity, they  never  come  out  at  the  same  door,  or  in  the 
same  position,  in  these  thronged  chambers  on  the  Bridge, 
at  which  they  entered,  but  always  farther  on,  farther  on ; 
for  each  place  of  gayety  lets  out  the  throng  at  an  advanced 


THE    TWO    WAYS    AND    THE    TWO    ENDS.  41 

door  and  post  of  travel  on  the  broad  road.  The  multitude 
do  not  notice  this.  Sometimes,  though  in  very  rare  in- 
stances, a  young  man  looks  about  him,  and  notices  that  he 
is  not  where  he  was  when  he  entered,  but  has  gone  singu- 
larly onward,  even  while  he  was  in  the  midst  of  his  gayety 
in  the  glittering  halls  of  sin  and  folly.  And  sometimes 
this  awakens  him  to  a  sense  of  his  danger.  But  the  multi- 
tude do  not  notice  nor  consider,  nor  care  to  notice,  but  dance 
on  from  theatre  to  theatre,  from  show  to  show,  from  folly 
to  folly,  encouraging,  sustaining,  animating,  and  leading 
one  another  onward.  The  force  of  example  and  fashion  is 
almost  omnipotent. 

And  what  makes  it  incalculably  worse,  and  what,  more- 
over, is  very  surprising,  people  meet  with  many  persons  in 
these  shows  at  the  sides  of  the  Bridge,  who  profess  to  be 
travelling  in  the  narrow  way,  and  who  say  that  no  doubt 
they  can  go  through  these  amusements  to  Heaven,  and  that 
the  path  thither  is  not  so  strait  and  narrow,  by  any  means, 
as  your  gloomy  fanatics  would  make  it.  But  it  was  not  a 
gloomy  fanatic,  but  our  blessed  Lord  himself,  who  said 
that  the  way  was  so  strait  and  narrow.  Nevertheless, 
these  people  contrive  to  hush  their  consciences,  and  en- 
deavor to  serve  God  and  Mammon ;  and  their  example, 
wearing,  as  they  sometimes  do,  the  profession  and  garb  of 
Christians,  tends  powerfully  to  prevent  alarm  on  the  part 
of  those  who  might  otherwise  be  conscience-smitten,  and 
thus  they  support  and  encourage  one  another,  and  keep  the 
Bridge,  notwithstanding  that  it  is  the  way  of  death,  a  scene 
of  great  apparent  gayety  and  life.  With  many  persons  it 
seems  to  be  regarded  as  sanctified,  not  by  the  word  of  God 
and  prayer,  as  the  apostle  says  our  enjoyments  should  be, 
but  by  a  bare  profession  of  religion. 

Another  thing  which  powerfully  tends  to  keep  this 
Bridge  a  scene  of  gayety  and  insensibility,  though  it  be  the 
way  of  death,  is  the  vast  quantity  of  what  is  called  light 
reading,  scattered  all  along  for  the  amusement  and  tempta- 


* 


42  THE    TWO    WAYS    AND    THE    TWO    ENDS. 

tion  of  passengers.  It  is  a  material,  even  the  best  of  it, 
which  tends  to  divert  the  thoughts  from  anything  serious 
or  heavenly,  and  much  of  it  is  adapted,  as  it  was  intended, 
to  set  the  passions  on  fire  of  hell.  The  god  of  this  world, 
who  governs  the  Bridge,  keeps  an  immense,  inexhaustible 
supply  of  it,  ia  all  shapes,  for  all  tastes,  habits  and  degrees 
of  initiation.  Immoral  tales  there  are,  which  allure  to 
vice,  even  while  professing  to  depict  its  misery  ;  and  de- 
scriptions that  teach  depravity,  and  surround  it  with  all 
the  coloring  of  romance,  while  merely  introducing  the 
reader  to  the  knowledge  of  human  nature.  Many  are  the 
souls  drawn  utterly  and  fatally  beneath  the  power  of  the 
Destroyer  by  these  pictures  of  sin,  both  in  prose  and 
poetry,  which  have  so  much  the  greater  power,  by  how 
much  the  mind  that  meets  them  is  young  and  inex- 
perienced. 

All  these  things  being  so,  said  I  to  my  Conductor,  how 
is  it  possible  that  any  persons,  once  entered  on  this  Bridge, 
can  ever  be  reclaimed  or  drawn  back  again?  It  seems 
that  without  some  miracle  they  must  crowd  on  in  an 
unbroken  tide  to  ruin.  If  it  rested  with  man  only, 
answered  he,  it  would  be  impossible ;  but  with  God  all 
things  are  possible,  and  nothing  is  beyond  the  reach  of  his 
grace.  Nevertheless  it  is  true,  that  persons  who  are  ever 
drawn  back  from  these  scenes,  after  they  have  become 
habituated  to  them,  are  as  brands  plucked  from  the  burn- 
ing. And  it  is  with  very  solemn  feelings  that  they  look 
back  upon  their  position,  when  they  have  regained  a  place 
of  mercy,  and  entered  on  the  way  of  faith  and  prayer. 
They  who  gain  the  upper  Bridge,  after  having  thus  far  and 
long  ran  forward  on  the  lower,  are  great  monuments  of 
God's  loving  kindness  and  forbearance,  of  the  power  of  his 
grace,  and  of  the  compassion  of  the  Saviour.  They  were 
dead,  but  are  alive  again,  they  were  lost,  but  are  found ; 
and  there  is  joy  in  heaven  over  them,  the  redemption  is  so 
great  and  glorious. 


THE    TWO    WAYS    AND    THE    TWO    ENDS.  43 

At  the  very  entrance  of  the  way  of  life  upon  the  upper 
Bridge,  continued  my  Conductor,  you  may  see  affecting 
scenes.  Sometimes  dear  families  part  there,  to  behold 
each  other  no  more.  One  or  two  individuals  perhaps  enter 
on  the  narrow  way,  while  the  others  hurry  down  to  the 
great  travelled  thoroughfare.  Sometimes  all  the  members 
of  a  family  but  just  one  go  in  at  the  gate  of  faith  and 
prayer,  and  that  one  strangely  and  awfully  rushes  down  to 
the  way  of  destruction.  Sometimes  the  parents  go  in 
at  the  narrow  way,  and  the  children  hurry  on  past  it.  But 
the  prayers  of  the  parents  pursue  them,  and  at  every 
station  on  their  own  heavenly  pilgrimage  they  look  w4th 
anxiety,  in  hope  that  the  lost  ones  may  be  found,  and 
brought  by  Christ  the  Redeemer  along  with  them,  rescued 
from  the  way  of  death.  Sometimes  the  children  enter 
the  blessed  gate,  while  the  parents  pass  on  to  the  gate  of 
destruction.  And  then  the  prayers  of  the  children  follow 
the  parents.  But  in  many,  many  cases,  the  separation  is 
eternal.  And  always  there  are  but  few  seen  entering  on 
the  path  of  light,  while  millions  on  millions  rush  down  to 
that  of  darkness. 

So  roll  on  these  two  tides ; — faith  in  the  one,  sense  in 
the  other ;  prayer  in  the  one,  prayerlessness  in  the  other ; 
yearning  after  God  and  self-abasement  in  the  one,  neglect 
of  God  and  self-dependence  in  the  other  ;  trembling  anxiety 
in  the  one,  heedlessness,  riot,  and  sport  in  the  other ;  hum- 
ble penitence  in  the  one,  hardness  and  an  impenitent  heart 
in  the  other ;  the  light  of  life  upon  the  one,  the  darkness 
of  the  pit  upon  the  other ;  heaven  at  the  close  of  the  one, 
hell  at  the  close  of  the  other.  O  the  tide  of  life  !  the  tide 
of  life !  Solemn  is  the  sight  to  a  spiritual  spectator,  who 
sees  its  diverging  ways,  and  the  differing  worlds  into 
which  it  opens.  Solemn  is  the  sight  to  one  who  knows 
and  feels  that  the  tide  of  life  is  the  tide  of  eternal  habit 
and  of  character,  advancing  to  the  world  of  retribution. 

Here,  said  my  Conductor,  is  the  end  of  our  allegory, 


44  THE    TWO    WAYS    AND    THE    TWO    ENDS. 

and  here  we  come  back  to  Mr.  Cecil's  remark,  that  the 
way  of  every  man  is  declarative  of  the  end  of  that  man. 
And  here  we  run  again  into  the  track  of  your  opening 
mood  of  thought,  yea,  we  are  far  forward  towards  the  con- 
clusion of  that  train  of  reasoning  upon  the  judgment. 
We  have  reason  to  believe  and  know,  that  the  book  of  life 
is  the  book  of  judgment ;  not  indeed  the  Lamb's  Book  of 
Life,  but  the  book  of  our  life,  daily.  As  we  live,  so  we 
shall  be  judged.  We  are  indeed  both  developing  and 
judging  ourselves  beforehand,  by  the  way  in  which  we  are 
travelling ;  the  development  and  the  judgment  will  be  per- 
fected at  the  end.  At  whatever  point  in  a  man's  char- 
acter the  end  comes,  there  he  remains  immutable,  there 
he  is  judged.  This  is  that  great  word  in  Revelation,  He 
that  is  unjust,  let  him  be  unjust  still ;  and  he  that  is  filthy, 
let  him  be  filthy  still.  But  he  that  is  rigliteous,  let  him 
be  righteous  still ;  and  he  that  is  holy,  let  hnxi  bo  holy  still. 
At  the  great  Harvest  there  will  be  the  great  Judgment 
of  character,  what  are  tares  and  what  are  wheat.  And 
then  the  Husbandman  Supreme  will  say  to  the  reapers, 
Gather  together  the  tares,  and  bind  them  in  bundles  to  burn 
them;  but  gather  the  wheat  into  my  barn.  After  the 
Harvest  there  can  be  no  new  development  or  change  of 
character ;  the  tares  cannot  change  into  wheat,  and  the 
wheat  can  never  become  tares. 

All  this  is  simply  the  way  of  a  man's  mortal  life, 
demonstrated  and  made  eternal  at  the  end.  The  way  of 
prayerlessness  and  unbelief  is  the  way  of  death  ;  and  an 
unbelieving,  unpraying  man  now  is  daily  living  out  the 
prophecy  and  judgment  in  regard  to  the  end  of  his  life ; 
daily  bringing  to  its  fulfilment  the  prediction  of  the 
Saviour,  If  ye  believe  not  in  me,  ye  shall  die  in  your 
sins.  After  this  there  is  no  more  curative  element,  or 
possibility  of  change.  For  men  to  die  in  their  sins,  is 
just  to  be  cut  down  by  the  reaper  Death,  as  tares.  There 
they  lie,   cut  down ;  waiting    for   the   angels ;   no   more 


THE    TWO    WAYS    AND    THE    TWO    ENDS.  45 

growth,  no  more  change ;  nothing  now  but  the  arm  and 
the  cord  needed,  that  is  to  bind  them  in  bundles  to  be 
burned. 

Now,  said  my  Conductor,  let  me  add  to  the  weighty 
remark  of  Mr.  Cecil  one  more  text  from  the  Divine  Book 
that  gave  him  his  heavenly  wisdom :  There  is  a  way  that 
seemeth  right  unto  a  man,  but  the  end  thereof  are  the 
ways  of  death.  This  is  that  way  ;  this  prayerless  way, 
this  way  of  worldliness  and  unbelief,  this  way  of  careless- 
ness in  sin,  this  Bridge  of  Destruction,  this  Broad  Way ; 
and  many  there  be  that  go  in  thereat.  Nor  does  any  man 
know  how  much  further  he  shall  travel  that  w^ay,  before 
he  comes  to  its  end.  The  pitfall  may  be  even  now  just  at 
his  feet,  waiting  for  a  few  more  steps,  or  perhaps  even  one, 
through  which  he  is  to  disappear  from  the  throng,  and  fall 
forever.  He  may  be  close  upon  the  end  of  his  way,  and 
even  while  he  is  thinking  of  an  effort  to  return,  yet 
deferring  it  a  little  longer,  the  end  may  come  within  that 
very  period  of  procrastination.  Because  his  feet  have  not 
yet  slidden,  there  is  no  security  for  him  against  that  decla- 
ration of  God,  Their  feet  shall  slide  in  due  time.  Surely, 
thou  didst  set  them  in  slippery  places ;  thou  castedst  them 
down  into  destruction.  How  are  they  brought  into  desola- 
tion as  in  a  moment !  They  are  utterly  consumed  with 
terrors. 

Do  you  think,  said  I  to  my  Conductor,  that  there  is  any 
peculiar  meaning  in  that  word  bundles,  as  applied  to 
the  tares  ? — Gather  them  in  bundles  to  burn  them,  but 
gather  the  wheat  into  my  barn.  Why  said  he,  there  may 
be,  if  you  choose,  a  very  sad  and  solemn  meaning,  over 
and  above  what  commonly  meets  the  ear.  It  may  mean 
that  the  wicked  will  be  classified,  and  that  evil  will  meet 
evil  of  the  same  form,  and  crime  be  associated  with  similar 
crime,  habit  with  habit,  disposition  with  disposition,  in  that 
outcast  world  after  the  Harvest,  that  world  composed  of 
the  prayerless,  the  hopeless,  the  fearful,  the  unbelieving, 


46  THE    TWO    WAYS    AND    THE    TWO    ENDS. 

the  abominable,  and  murderers,  and  whoremongers,  and 
sorcerers,  and  idolaters,  and  all  liars.  Bundles  of  each  ! 
You  know  well  that  the  tares,  in  the  description  of  the  Judg- 
ment by  Christ,  are  the  same  thing  with  the  chaff  in  the 
preaching  of  John  for  repentance,  and  that  both  are  reserved 
unto  fire  unquenchable.  The  enemy  that  sowed  them  is  the 
Devil,  and  he  will  carry  his  own  harvest  to  his  own  home. 

On  the  other  hand,  he  that  goeth  forth  and  weepeth, 
bearing  precious  seed,  shall  doubtless  come  again  with  re- 
joicing, bringing  his  sheaves  with  him.  A  wheat  sheaf  is 
a  beautiful,  cheerful,  grateful  thing,  emblem  of  life,  sweet 
seasons,  and  abundance,  reminding  us  to  put  up  the  prayer. 
Give  us  this  day  our  daily  bread.  But  a  bundle  of  tares, 
withered,  dry,  fruitless,  the  mere  material  for  a  crackling 
fire,  is  a  warning  image  ;  lead  us  not  into  temptation,  but 
deliver  us  from  the  evil  one,  the  sower  of  tares,  and  the 
proprietor  of  fire  unquenchable.  If  you  are  of  the  tares, 
when  the  harvest  comes,  nothing  can  save  you  from  going 
to  your  own  place.  If  you  are  of  the  wheat,  then,  when 
the  universe  is  burning,  you  will  be  safe  in  the  barn  of 
your  Father — the  kingdom  of  your  Father,  where  the 
righteous  shine  forth  as  the  sun. 

Well,  said  I,  the  second  part  of  your  allegory  is  indeed 
solemn  and  sad,  yet  deeply  instructive.  But  I  wish  you 
might  close  it  with  something  sweeter,  something  rather 
Like  the  fiirst  path  of  light,  ending  in  heaven. 

Why,  said  he,  what  can  I  give  you  sweeter  than  Christ's 
own  words,  Him  that  cometh  unto  me,  I  will  in  no  wise 
cast  out.  Come  unto  me,  all  ye  that  labor  and  are  heavy 
laden,  and  I  will  give  you  rest.  Take  my  yoke  upon  you, 
and  learn  of  me,  for  I  am  meek  and  lowly  of  heart,  and  ye 
shall  find  rest  unto  your  souls.  For  my  yoke  is  easy,  and 
my  burden  is  light.  Every  dark  description  of  sin  and  its 
consequences,  every  sad  and  solemn  revelation  of  the  world 
of  retribution  after  Harvest,  is  meant  to  give  power  to  those 
sweet  invitations.     Either  you  must  hold  to  the  one,  and 


TIIE    TWO    WAYS    AND    THE    TAVO    ENDS.  47 

escape  the  other,  or  neglect  the  one,  and  endure  the  other. 
For,  as  the  tares  are  gathered  and  burned  in  the  fire,  so 
shall  it  be  in  the  end  of  this  world.  The  Son  of  Man  shall 
send  forth  his  angels,  and  they  shall  gather  out  of  his  king- 
dom all  things  that  offend,  and  them  which  do  iniquity,  and 
shall  cast  them  into  a  furnace  of  fire ;  there  shall  be  weep- 
ing and  gnashing  of  teeth.  Then  shall  the  righteous  shine 
forth  as  the  sun  in  the  kingdom  of  their  Father.  Who^ 
hath  ears  to  hear,  let  him  hear. 

Yea,  and  you  may  hear  other  things  if  you  listen  atten- 
tively. You  may  hear  the  footsteps  and  the  talk  of  beings 
of  the  invisible  world  more  frequent  than  usual  around 
you.  You  hear  the  Great  Husbandman  in  his  vineyard. 
He  speaks  to  the  dresser  of  it.  Behold  these  three  years  I 
come  seeking  fruit  of  this  fig-tree,  and  find  none  ;  cut  it 
down ;  why  cumbereth  the  ground  ?  And  you  hear  the 
interceding  answer,  Lord,  let  it  alone  this  year  also,  till  I 
shall  dig  about  it  and  dung  it.  And  if  it  bear  fruit,  well ; 
but  if  not,  then  after  that  thou  shalt  cut  it  down.  Perhaps 
last  year  this  conversation  was  held  concerning  you.  If  so, 
how  momentous  is  the  question  whether  now,  as  the  year 
pleaded  for  is  waning,  the  Great  Husbandman  sees  the 
signs  of  fruit.  Does  the  year,  so  swiftly  passing,  sweetly 
travel  on  its  way  for  him  ?  Is  the  axe,  which  was  in  the 
hand  of  the  dresser  of  the  vineyard,  dropped,  because  there 
is  life  in  the  fig-tree  ?  Shall  the  appointment  of  harvest, 
in  reference  to  you,  be  that  of  the  angelic  reapers,  who  are 
to  do  the  blissful  work  of  gathering  the  bright  golden 
sheaves  of  Divine  grace  for  heaven?  The  Lord  bless  thee 
out  of  Zion ! 

Methought  Death  laid  his  hands  on  me 

And  did  his  prisoner  bind  ; 
And  by  the  sound  methought  I  heard 

His  Master's  feet  behind. 
Methought  I  stood  upon  the  shore, 

And  nothing  could  I  see, 
But  the  vast  ocean,  with  my  eyes, 

A  vast  Eternity ! 


48  THE    TWO    WAYS    AND    THE    TWO    ENI>S. 

Methought  I  heard  the  midnight  cry, 

Behold  the  Bridegroom  comes! 
Methought  I  was  called  to  the  bar 

Where  souls  receive  their  dooms. 
The  world  was  at  an  end  to  me, 

As  if  it  all  did  burn : 
But  lo !  there  came  a  voice  from  heaven, 

Which  ordered  my  return. 

.  Lord,  I  returned  at  thy  command. 

What  wilt  thou  have  me  do  1 
O  let  me  wholly  live  to  thee. 

To  whom  my  life  I  owe ; 
Fain  would  I  dedicate  to  thee 

The  remnant  of  my  days. 
Lord,  with  my  life  renew  my  heart, 

That  both  thy  name  may  praise. 


AN  APOLOGUE   ON  FIRE. 


I  MET  my  friend  and  guide  again  after  a  little  interval, 
and  my  thoughts  were  turned  upon  the  harvest  and  the 
fire,  especially  the  tares  gathered  in  bundles  to  be  burned. 
My  guide  led  me  to  the  consideration  of  the  cure  or 
quenching  of  fire  by  fire,  and  especially  the  prevention  of 
fire  among  tares  in  the  eternal  world,  by  the  tares  of  evil 
habits  being  gathered  in  bundles,  and  burned  up  in  this 
world.  I  shall  just  report  his  own  words,  without  stop  or 
question,  from  beginning  to  end. 


THE    FIRES    OF    SATAN,    AND    THE    FIRES    OF    GOD. 

There  is  a  great  fire  burning  in  the  world.  Wickedness 
burneth  as  the  fire.  Sometimes  it  is  a  low,  concealed, 
smouldering  fire,  like  spontaneous  combustion  in  the  hold 
of  a  cotton  ship,  kept  for  a  time  from  bursting  forth  into  a 
flame.  So  the  fire  of  sin  holds  on,  unsuspected,  in  a  man's 
nature,  especially  a  man  who  has  been  relying  on  his  own 
morality,  and  has  never  been  taught  the  nature  of  sin  by 
the  Spirit  of  God.  So  it  burns  in  his  hold,  even  in  the 
very  cargo  of  his  virtues,  even  while,  with  all  sail  set,  and 
marked  of  the  world  for  the  beauty  and  stateliness  of  his 
appearance,  he  keeps  his  course  across  the  ocean  of  life, 
in  full  confidence  of  a  harbor.  He  may  keep  the  hatches 
down  for  a  season,  and  may  think  all  is  well,  but  the  fire 
is  burning,  and  even  if  he  should  get  into  port,  the  moment 


50  AN    APOLOGUE    ON    FIRE. 

the  vessel  is  opened  for  discharging^  it  will  be  all  one  sheet 
of  flame. 

Sometimes  it  is  an  open  fire,  and  leaps  and  rolls  and 
hisses  np,  like  a  fierce  forest  conflagration.  So  it  often 
burns  in  great  and  open  sins,  with  individuals  and  commu- 
nities. The  sins  of  Sodom  were  a  flaming  fire  more  ter- 
rible and  devouring  than  the  storms  of  burning  brimstone. 
The  fire  unseen,  or  unacknowledged,  is  infinitely  worse 
than  that  which  is  seen  and  guarded  against.  The  sins  of 
the  cities  buried  beneath  the  lava  of  Vesuvius  were  worse 
than  the  fires  of  the  burning  mountain,  though  pouring 
down  in  torrents.  Open  or  concealed,  in  single  souls,  or 
families,  or  cities,  or  kingdoms,  or  conflicting  armies, 
wickedness  bumeth  as  the  fire ;  it  burneth  the  world  over, 
this  workl. 

But  there  is  a  greater  fire  coming ;  the  day  when  all 
that  do  wickedly  shall  be  burned  up  like  chaff*  with  fire  un- 
quenchable. Now  there  is  a  restraint  even  ^^)on  the  fire  of  sin ; 
then  there  will  be  none.  God  will  let  it  burn  on,  and  take 
its  own  way  without  interruption.  And  not  only  so,  but 
the  great  globe  itself,  and  all  that  is  therein,  shall  be  burned 
up ;  and  then  all  minor  fires  that  remain  burning,  when 
all  that  is  material  shall  have  been  consumed,  shall  be 
themselves,  with  death  and  hell,  cast  into  the  lake  of  fire 
that  burneth  everlastingly.  Happy  is  he  in  whom,  or  about 
whom,  this  great  day  of  fire  shall  find  nothing  but  what 
is  material  to  consume  ;  happy  he,  in  whom  the  fire  of  the 
Great  Refiner  beforehand  has  burned  up  all  that  was  sinful, 
and  left  an  immortality  of  holiness  and  blessedness.  Happy 
the  soul  in  Christ,  at  that  day  of  doom.  In  that  fire, 
everything  will  be  burned  up  that  can  be,  and  if  anything 
outlasts  that  fire,  and  keeps  on  burning,  it  will  be  just  only 
a  sinful  soul,  just  the  fire  unquenchable.  All  the  smoke 
you  will  see  when  the  universe  is  burned  up,  and  the  ele- 
ments themselves  shall  have  melted  with  flaming  heat, 
•\vill  be  the  smoke  of  the  bottomless  pit,  a  combustion  of 


AN    APOLOGUE    ON    FIRE.  51 

unquenchable  wickedness,  amidst  the  blackness  of  dark- 
ness forever. 

There  are  different  kinds  of  fire  ;  and  one  kind  may  be 
but  the  emblem  of  another.  There  is  the  fire  of  Divine 
love,  a  fire  of  ecstatic  life  and  enjoyment  in  the  soul,  a  fire  t 
that  burns  up  sin,  removes  the  dross,  and  shows  God's 
image.  Material  fire  is  an  emblem  of  that,  for  it  flames  up 
towards  heaven  ;  it  seeks  the  sun,  and  subdues  all  things  * 
to  itself,  and  purifies  all  things.  But  there  is  also  the  fire 
of  selfishness  and  sinful  passion,  and  of  that  likewise 
material  fire  is  an  emblem,  painful,  overmastering,  consum- 
ing all  the  forms  of  material  life,  beauty  and  happiness, 
reducing  the  costliest  things  to  ashes,  producing  in  an  ani- 
mated frame  intolerable  agony.  There  is,  both  in  a  material 
and  spiritual  point  of  view,  a  fire  of  refinement  and  purifi- 
cation, and  a  fire  of  wrath  and  punishment. 

Now  it  makes  a  great  difference  whether  a  man  sets  the 
fire  himself,  or  God  sets  it ;  and  also,  whether  a  man  sets 
the  fire  himself,  or  leaves  his  heaps  of  dry  chaff  in  the  way 
to  catch  it.  If  a  man  leaves  the  chaff  and  stubble  of  his 
sins  within  and  around  him,  his  own  breath  as  fire  shall  in 
due  time  devour  him.  But  if  a  man  will  set  fire  to  his 
own  sins,  instead  of  cherishing  the  fire  of  sin,  and  gathering 
materials  for  it,  he  shall  save  himself  by  fire  from  the  fire. 
If  we  will  judge  and  condemn  ourselves,  Paul  says  we 
shall  not  be  condemned.  And  Christ  says.  If  thine  eye 
offend  thee,  pluck  it  out  and  cast  it  from  thee ;  or  if  thy 
right  hand  offend  thee,  cut  it  off,  and  cast  it  from  thee.  It 
is  better  to  enter  into  life  by  so  doing,  than  to  go  into  hell- 
fire  with  two  hands  or  two  eyes,  prepared  for  that  fire 
in  the  service  of  sin.  A  man  may  either  keep  kindling 
and  cherishing  the  fires  of  sin  in  his  being,  or  he  may,  by 
God's  grace,  kindle  a  fire  against  sin  itself,  and  may  burn 
up  his  own  sins.  If  he  will  set  this  fire  himself,  he  may 
be  saved  ;  there  shall  be  no  fire  for  him  hereafter  ;  but  if 
he  leaves  his  sins  to  catch  fire  from  abroad,  or  leaves  them 


52  AN    APOLOGUE    ON    FIRE. 

to  be  burned  up  by  God's  avenging  fire,  he  is  lost,  and 
nothing  can  save  him.  Man  sets  the  fire  of  sin,  God  only 
sets  the  fire  against  sin  ;  man  may  destroy  himself,  God 
only  can  save  him. 

And  so  it  makes  a  great  difference  whether  God  sets  the 
fire  from  within  or  from  without ;  and  whether  he  sets  the 
fire  as  a  consumer  or  an  avenger,  to  burn  up  sin,  or  to 
punish  it ;  whether  he  acts  as  a  refiner  and  purifier,  or  a 
just  and  holy  judge,  executing  the  law  against  the  sinner. 
If  God  sets  the  fire  from  within,  it  is  the  fire  of  his  grace, 
and  it  burns  up  the  sin,  but  spares  the  sinner,  and  saves 
him  from  the  fire  unquenchable.  If  God  sets  the  fire  from 
without,  he  does  it  while  in  this  world,  oftentimes  to  make 
the  sinner  see  and  feel  the  terribleness  of  the  fire  in  his  own 
soul,  and  the  necessity  of  having  it  extinguished.  I  have 
set  him  on  fire  round  about,  says  God,  describing  these 
merciful  methods  of  his  providence,  yet  he  knew  it  not ; 
yea,  I  have  burned  him,  yet  he  laid  it  not  to  heart.  And 
if  this  state  of  things  continues,  if  a  man  thus  hardens 
himself  in  sin  and  heedlessness,  even  under  God's  correc- 
tion, then  that  must  take  place  which  God  speaks  in  regard 
to  such  persons,  that  under  all  their  glory  and  pride,  he 
will  kindle  a  burning  like  the  burning  of  a  fire.  And  the 
Light  of  Israel  shall  be  for  a  fire,  and  his  Holy  One  for  a 
flame,  and  it  shall  burn  and  devour  his  thorns  and  his 
briers,  and  the  glory  of  his  forest  and  his  fruitful  field,  both 
soul  and  body. 

So  that  it  makes  also  an  infinite  difference  whether 
God  sets  his  fire  in  this  world  or  the  next.  If  in  this 
world,  and  it  is  the  fire  of  his  providence,  it  may  bring  the 
sinner  to  repentance,  and  save  him  from  the  fire  everlast- 
ing ;  if  it  is  the  fire  of  his  grace  set  within  the  soul,  it  will 
save  the  sinner  from  every  other  fire,  and  render  every 
other  either  harmless  or  wholesome.  But  if  God's  fire  be 
resisted,  and  the  experience  of  it  reserved  to  the  world  to 
come,  there  it  can  no  longer  be  a  fire  of  grace,  but  only  of 


AN    APOLOGUE    ON    FIRE.  53 

punishment.  God's  own  attributes  are  as  a  fire.  Our 
God  is  a  consuming  fire.  But  the  sinner  makes  his  own 
election  whether  God  shall  burn  up  his  sins  by  grace,  or 
burn  himself  up  because  of  his  sins ;  if  he  chooses  to  hold 
forever  to  his  sins,  then  will  God  burn  him.  God  is  a 
consuming  fire  to  sin,  and  to  the  sinner  if  he  holds  to  sin. 
But  if  any  will  trust  in  him, — will  come  to  him  in  obedi- 
ence and  faith,  to  be  delivered  from  sin,  for  such  he  will  be 
only  a  consuming  fire  to  their  enemies,  and  a  refiner's  fire 
to  themselves.  For  I,  saith  the  Lord,  speaking  of  his  loving 
kindness  to  his  church  and  people,  will  be  unto  them  a  wall 
of  fire  round  about  them,  and  a  glory  in  the  midst  of  them. 
We  must  all  have  God  to  be  for  us  either  this  protecting 
w^all  of  fire,  and  this  inward  fountain  of  light  and  glory,  or 
else  a  consuming  fire  upon  us  and  against  us  because 
of  sin. 

Now  let  me  call  your  attention  to  a  familiar  illustration 
of  these  principles.  1  have  read  of  a  missionary  travelling 
among  the  prairies  in  South  Africa,  overtaken  by  a  fire  in 
the  long  dry  grass  over  which  the  course  of  the  journey  lay. 
The  progress  of  the  flames,  from  the  moment  when  their 
roar  became  audible,  and  the  smoke  visible  in  the  distance, 
was  fearfully  rapid,  beyond  anything  the  man  had  ever 
seen  or  heard  of.  He  and  his  party,  with  their  wagons, 
oxen  and  all,  came  near  being  burned  to  destruction.  The 
roar  of  the  flames  was  like  that  of  artillery,  and  they  ran 
along  the  ground  like  a  thick  continuous  sheet  of  lightning. 
Not  one  moment  was  to  be  lost.  The  missionary  jumped 
from  his  wagon,  with  a  box  of  lucifers  in  his  hand,  intend- 
ing, by  setting  fire  to  the  dry  stubble  immediately  around 
them,  and  so  letting  it  burn  from  the  centre  outwards,  to 
clear  a  place  for  the  feet  of  the  oxen,  and  cause  them  to 
pass  into  it  with  the  party,  so  that  the  driving  sheet  of 
flame  should  not  envelop  and  overwhelm  them — otherwise 
they  would  have  dropped  dead  in  the  midst  of  it.  On' 
hastily  opening  the  lucifer  box,  to  his  extreme  terror  he  T 


54 


AN    APOLOGUE    ON    FIRE. 


found  it  contained  only  two  remaining  matches,  and  the 
first  one  of  those  failed.  What  a  moment  of  suspense  and 
anxiety  I  Most  providentially  and  happily  the  second 
match  struck  fire,  and  in  less  than  a  minute  the  grass 
around  them  was  in  flames,  and  a  space  was  cleared  out- 
wards, into  the  centre  of  which  they  drove.  But  it  was 
scarcely  done  when  the  main  body  of  the  fire  reached 
them,  leaping,  careering,  like  ten  thousand  demons  frantic 
for  their  prey.  Had  not  the  space  been  cleared  by  their 
own  burning,  before  the  whirlwind  of  fire  swept  by,  its 
baptism  would  have  left  them  lifeless.  And  even  as  it 
was,  they  were  in  great  danger.  Although  they  crowded 
together  as  far  from  the  fire  as  the  space  they  had  gained 
would  admit,  yet  the  heat  was  almost  beyond  endurance, 
and  for  a  few  seconds  they  could  scarcely  breathe.  Never- 
theless, the  flames  touched  them  not,  and  in  three  minutes 
they  were  safe,  and  the  fiery  whirlwind  was  tossing  and 
roaring  beyond  them.  Before  it  came  they  had  burned  up 
the  materials  that  otherwise  would  have  fed  it  to  their  own 
destruction. 

Now  there  is  a  great  moral  in  all  this.  We  must  set 
fire  to  our  own  homebred,  individual,  and  social  evils,  or 
we  shall  have  no  space  to  stand  upon  in  the  midst  of  the 
great  fire  that  comes  roaring  over  the  world.  It  burns 
with  rapid,  resistless,  overwhelming  fury,  even  this  sidt) 
the  grave,  enveloping  the  soul  that  is  not  prepared  against 
it,  in  a  scathing  flame  of  temptation.  But  when  a  man, 
by  the  reformation  and  regeneration  of  his  own  nature, 
through  God's  grace,  has  cleared  a  space  around  him,  or 
rather  when  God  has  cleared  it  for  him,  it  is  a  wonderful 
defence  against  the  fires  of  sin  on  every  side.  If  this  be 
not  done,  if  his  own  sins  are  set  on  fire  from  abroad,  if  the 
devils  fires  that  come  sweeping  over  the  prairies  of  this 
world,  find  the  dry  grass  of  the  man's  passions  all  ready, 
like  tinder,  neither  mown  down  nor  burned  over  by  himself, 
the  fire  will  go  over  him  and  burn  him  up.    .But  if  he  has 


AN    APOLOGUE    ON    FIRE.  55 

been  working  beforehand,  and  has  himself  begun  the  barn- 
ing  at  his  own  door,  in  his  own  heart,  in  his  own  habits, 
all  the  fires  that  can  be  set  sweeping  around  him  will  not 
harm  him. 

Now  you  may  apply  this  to  social  evils,  to  moral,  and 
even  material  nuisances  of  every  kind.  Put  out  of  the 
way  all  exciting  causes  of  a  pestilence  like  the  cholera, 
remove  the  filth  from  your  streets,  ventilate  3^our  houses, 
make  the  habits  of  the  people  cleanly,  and  above  all,  burn 
up  or  remove  all  intoxicating  drinks,  and  make  the  habit 
of  temperance  universal,  and  then,  although  a  European 
atmosphere  with  the  cholera  stratum  shrouded  in  it  should 
cross  the  Atlantic,  and  brood  like  the  wings  of  the  Destroy- 
ing Angel  over  our  city,  yet  the  plague  might  not  take; 
the  pestilential  miasma  might  not  strike  from  the  cloud, 
just  for  want  of  those  conducting  agents  to  which  it  has 
been  accustomed,  and  with  which  it  has  such  friendly  and 
fearful  affinities.  But  let  the  streets  be  filled  with  accu- 
mulated filth,  and  the  houses  with  impure  air,  let  whole 
squares  oi  miserable  buildings  and  cellars  be  crowded  with 
squalid,  vicious,  dissolute  tenants,  and  above  all,  let  the 
dram  shops  at  every  corner  be  kept  open,  and  let  intem- 
perance prevail,  and  then  not  at  one,  but  at  a  thousand 
points,  the  plague  will  take,  the  infection  will  spread,  the 
lightning  of  death  will  strike. 

Now  in  all  cases,  they  who  go  to  the  source  of  evils, 
they  who  labor  to  remove  the  causes  of  them,  they  who  set 
in  operation  the  means  of  prevention,  they  who  gather  up 
out  of  the  way  the  materials  that  otherwise  would  be  food 
for  the  fire,  are  doing  one  of  the  noblest  works  of  personal 
and  social  benevolence.  If,  by  God's  grace,  they  are 
carrying  on  this  reformation  with  themselves,  they  are  • 
preparing  and  fixing  conductors  for  the  mercy  of  heaven, 
not  its  wrath — for  the  element  of  life,  not  death — they  are 
creating  and  setting  at  work  disinfecting  agencies,  noff 
noxious  ones.     Every  evil  habit  that  they  conquer,  every  Jj 


5Q  AN    APOLOGUE    ON    FIRE. 

vicious  element  they  neutralize  or  annihilate  is  an  insu- 
rance for  the  benefit  of  society.  Could  only  ten  men,  or 
even  five,  of  Sodom,  have  been  persuaded  to  follow  the 
example,  adopt  the  religious  principles,  and  obey  the  God 
of  Lot,  the  w^hole  dissolute  city  would  have  been  safe  from 
the  gathering  storms  of  fiery  vengeance.  So  the  best 
patriot,  the  best  lover  of  his  city  and  his  country,  is  he 
who  becomes  from  the  heart  and  in  the  life  a  true  Chris- 
tian. That  person  is  doing  the  greatest  work  fo/his  coun- 
try and  his  race,  who  is  growing  most  in  grace,  and  in  the 
knowledge  and  likeness  of  his  God  and  Saviour. 

And  in  regard  to  work  done  upon  and  in  behalf  of  others, 
those  persons  especially  are  doing  a  great  and  glorious 
work,  who  are  seeking  and  gathering  immortal  beings  to  be 
changed  and  purified.  He  that  winneth  souls  is  wise,  not 
he  that  is  most  skilful  in  gathering  grains  of  gold  and 
washing  them.  They  who  are  gathering  children  out  of 
the  streets,  preserving  them  from  places  of  temptation  and 
infamy,  and  making  such  arrangements  for  them  that 
they  shall  grow  up  to  be  themselves  the  reforming  elements 
and  agents  of  society,  instead  of  the  coadjutors,  the  tools, 
the  materials  of  the  great  malignant  Incendiary,  are  doing 
a  great  part  towards  the  world's  redemption.  All  who  are 
thus  taught,  thus  purified,  instead  of  offering  food  for  the 
fires  of  Satan  sweeping  over  the  world,  are  constituting  a 
clearing  where  the  fire  finds  no  nourishment,  and  shall  have 
no  power.  The  Sabbath  school  makes  many  such  clear- 
ings. The  institution  of  the  Home  for  the  Friendless  makes 
such  a  clearing.  It  is  one  of  the  rallying  places  of  strong 
virtue  and  piety  in  the  city — one  of  the  centres  of  refuge, 
where  God's  good  Providence  and  grace,  and  not  the  fires 
of  sin,  have  burned  over  a  space  for  us  to  occupy  safely, 
amidst  the  flames  roaring  around  us.  The  vantage  ground 
thus  gained  ought  to  be  well  held.  It  should  be  improved 
to  the  uttermost.  Let  this  work  of  benevolence  be  sus- 
tained, and  not  only  sustained,  but  let  the  means  of  its 


AN    APOLOGUE    ON    FIRE.  57 

benevolent  operations  be  increased,  and,  generation  after 
generation,  it  will  be  an  incalculable  blessing  to  society. 

But  this  is  a  thing  by  the  way.  The  great  instruction 
for  us  is  personal,  as  to  our  own  escape  from  the  fire,  or 
preparation  for  it.  There  is  really  no  escape,  but  by  the 
burning  up  of  our  own  sins,  within  us  and  round  about  us. 
The  fire  which  consumes  sin,  and  is  lighted,  by  God's 
grace,  for  ourselves,  must  meet  the  fire  that  sin  feeds,  and 
so  stop  it,  giving  us  in  Christ  a  place  of  safety.  Let  fire 
meet  fire  in  this  world,  and  we  are  safe ;  but  if  we  wait 
for  the  fire  to  overtake  us  from  abroad  first,  then  we  are 
lost.  The  fire  will  be  set,  and  either  in  this  world  or 
the  next  we  must  experience  it.  If  we  experience  it  here, 
we  may  be  saved  from  it  in  the  next  world.  Either  here 
or  there,  God  himself  will  set  it,  and  I  have  said  that  it 
makes  an  infinite  difference  whether  God  sets  the  fire 
against  sin  in  this  world  or  the  eternal  world.  But  in 
reality  it  is  already  set  there,  and  it  is  roaring  on  to  meet 
every  sinful  creature,  although  it  was  prepared  not  for 
man,  but  for  the  devil  and  his  angels.  If  God  sets  it  in 
this  world,  it  is  to  meet  and  conquer  the  fire  unquenchable, 
by  destroying  all  the  material  which  would  otherwise  be 
presented  for  that  fire  to  prey  upon.  It  is  the  fire  of  grace 
overcoming  sin,  which  is  the  elemental  fire  of  hell.  But 
the  work  of  grace  is  finished  in  this  world  ;  there  is  no 
conflict  of  grace  against  sin  in  the  next  world  ;  the  dross 
must  all  be  burned  away  here,  and  Christ's  image  estab- 
lished, or  there  will  be  no  burning  there  but  the  everlasting 
burnings ;  and  if  the  fire  be  set  in  the  next  world  for  us, 
it  can  be  only  the  fire  of  retributive  justice. 

God  warns  us  of  it,  calls  our  attention  to  it,  shows  us 
that  in  our  sins  we  are  directly  in  its  path,  and  as  a  bundle 
of  dry  tares  are  prepared  for  it,  to  be  consumed  by  it. 
God  gives  us  time  to  clear  ourselves  a  space  to  stand  upon, 
but  no  time  to  lose ;  the  flame  may  be  close  at  hand  ;  it 
may  be  upon  us  before  we  are  aware.     We  have  God's 

2* 


58  AN    APOLOGUE    ON    FIRE. 

word  and  God's  grace,  with  which  we  may  strike  the  fire 
that  shall  save  us,  but  we  must  do  it  quickly,  or  the  fire 
will  be  on  us,  over  us,  within  us,  around  us.  We  may 
hear  its  roar,  its  thunder  ;  we  may  see  its  lurid  glare. 
We  may  possibly  think  it  is  yet  distant,  but  it  comes  with 
incredible  swiftness,  and  wo  to  those  whom  it  overtakes  in 
the  stubble  of  their  sins.  They  are  brought  into  desolation 
as  in  a  moment ;  they  are  utterly  consumed  with  terrors. 

Now  suppose  that  in  reference  to  the  world  to  come, 
and  the  fires  of  retribution  there,  we  were  placed  like  that 
Missionary,  with  only  two  more  opportunities  of  escape 
remaining ;  just  as  he,  on  opening  his  box,  found  to  his 
alarm  that  there  were  but  two  matches  left.  Would  there 
be  any  time  to  be  lost  ?  But  we  are  merely  supposing 
what  all  the  world  over,  beneath  the  light  and  offers  of  the 
gospel,  is  a  reality,  continually,  with  some.  With  whom, 
by  name,  is  a  matter  of  perfect  uncertainty  to  us,  but  not 
to  God.  But  suppose  it  were  our  case.  Suppose  we  had 
come  to  our  last  opportunity,  and  the  fire  roaring  upon  us, 
what  is  to  be  done  ?  Can  we  stop  the  fire,  turn  it  back, 
put  it  out,  or  cover  ourselves  with  a  garment  that  shall  be 
proof  against  it  ?  Who  is  he  that  can  do  this  but  God 
only,  God  in  Christ,  God  our  Saviour  ?  Who  else  can 
forgive  sins  but  he  only  ?  Who  can  pluck  from  the  soul 
one  rooted  sorrow,  or  in  the  least  minister  to  a  mind 
diseased,  but  he,  the  Great  Physician  of  the  soul?  It  is 
upon  him  that  we  must  cast  ourselves,  and  thus  only  can 
we  be  safe.  Our  very  anxiety  is  such  sometimes  that  in 
a  case  of  extreme  danger  we  hardly  know  what  to  do 
with  our  very  opportunities.  And  the  soul  under  convic- 
tion of  sin  is  sometimes  like  a  theatre  on  fire  with  the 
doors  opening  inward,  but  the  terrified  inmates,  in  their 
very  anxiety  to  escape,  pressing  against  them  and  closing 
them  irrecoverably.  Just  so  our  souls,  under  sentence  of 
God's  holy  law,  are  full  of  fiery  accusing  thoughts,  and 
we  press  against  the  doors  of  deliverance,  and  Christ  only 


AN    APOLOGUE    ON    FIRE.  59 

can  open  them.  But  he  opens  them  to  faith,  and  puts  out 
the  fires,  and  saves  us.  Nay,  he  gives  us  the  faith  first, 
puts  it  into  our  bosoms,  as  a  key,  just  as  Christian  found 
the  Key  of  Promise  that  could  open  every  lock  in  Doubt- 
ing Castle,  kept  by  Giant  Despair.  Then  we  hear  his 
voice.  The  Key  !  the  Key  !  Try  the  Key,  and  come  forth 
into  life  and  liberty ! 

Sinful  habits  are  fearful,  fiery  things.  Ordinarily  they 
are  eternal ;  it  is  rare  that  they  are  changed.  And  a  single 
choice  may  become  a  habit,  may  take  precedence  in  the 
v^hole  character,  and  grow  into  a  despotism  that  never  can 
be  broken.  Most  of  those  persons  who  perish  through  in- 
temperance, forge  in  the  fires  of  youth  the  first  links  of  the 
dreadful  chain  that  envelops  them.  The  Latin  maxim  is 
full  of  wisdom,  Obsta  principiis.  Resist  the  beginnings. 
Let  not  the  present  pleasures  or  gratifications  with  which 
Satan,  or  your  tempting  companions,  or  your  own  ungov- 
erned  passions,  may  allure  you  to  evil,  prevail  with  you  to 
begin  the  dread  habit  of  indulgence.  Beware  the  first 
step  of  a  habit,  or  if  you  have  taken  it,  break  from  it  before 
it  becomes  eternal.  Break  from  it  now,  or  it  is  likely  to 
become  eternal.  Remember  that  the  pleasure  is  only  mo- 
mentary; the  habit  to  which,  for  the  pleasure,  you  sell 
your  birth -right,  is  inveterate,  and  comes  at  last  to  be 
nothing  but  agony.  That  great  writer,  Mr.  Coleridge, 
says,  speaking  of  vicious  pleasures,  in  part  from  his  own 
dread  experience  of  evil,  and  therefore  the  more  solemnly, 
"  Centries,  or  wooden  frames,  are  put  under  the  arches  of 
a  bridge,  to  remain  no  longer  than  till  the  latter  are  con- 
solidated. Even  so,  pleasures  are  the  devil's  scaffolding  to 
build  a  habit  upon — that  once  formed  and  steady,  the 
pleasures  are  sent  for  firewood^  and  the  hell  begins  in 
this  lifeP 


THE   TWO   TEMPTATIONS: 

AND  THE  DISPOSITION  OF  THEM. 

PART   I. 

A  FEW  days  after  this,  my  former  guide  met  me  with  an- 
other text  and  story,  for  which  he  had  both  a  prologue  and 
epilogue  to  match.  He  said  the  text  was  merely  a  condensed 
description  of  a  good  deal  of  the  piety  of  modern  times, 
though  some  might  deny  its  application.  It  was  that  pithy 
rebuke  by  the  Prophet  Hosea,  My  people  ask  counsel  at 
their  stocks.  Dg^iL.think,  staid,  he,  that  there  ever  was  a 
Wall-Street  in  Judea  ?  Did  the  people  there  ask  counsel 
at  their  stocks,  more  habitually  than  they  do  now  in  Lon- 
don ?  Stocks  now  are  one  of  the  most  universal  syno- 
nymes'  of  riches  ;  stocks  in  the  olden  time  were  idols  ; 
which  form,  think  you,  now,  of  the  idol,  is  most  heartily 
and  universally  worshipped  ? 

The  old  fashioned  heathen  and  Pagan  idolatry  said  of 
their  stocks.  Ye  are  our  father,  and  of  a  stone.  Thou  hast 
made  me.  The  more  customary  idolatry  of  covetousness 
in  modern  times  also  worships  stocks,  and  says  of  any  acute 
successful  speculation  in  them  by  the  worshipper.  It  has 
been  the  making  of  him.  Stocks  are  doubtless  worshipped 
now,  not  indeed  exactly  in  the  same  way  as  of  old,  but 
still  as  the  god  of  the  affections,  a  household,  social, 
and  commercial  god.  In  the  same  manner  the  staff  in  old 
times  was  used  for  divination,  and  so  men  relied  upon  their 


THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS.  61 

staves  ;  ''  their  staff  declareth  unto  them."  Now  that  this 
kind  of  heathenish  divination  is  exploded,  men  have  another 
staff  to  declare  unto  them.  A  man  idolatrous  in  the  way 
of  covetousness  leans  upon  his  wealth  as  his  staff,  and 
makes  that  his  diviner,  his  seer,  his  soothsayer. 

Both  these  things  are  idolatry ;  and  it  is  hard  to  say, 
considering  the  greater  light  upon  the  one  than  the  other, 
which  is  the  worse.  Under  the  new  and  more  spiritual 
dispensation  we  have  reason  to  fear  there  is  almost  as  much 
idolatry  as  under  the  old.  Both  forms  of  idolatry  lavish 
gold  out  of  the  bag,  and  weigh  silver  in  the  balance,  and 
hire  a  goldsmith,  and  he  maketh  it  a  god  ;  they  fall  down, 
yea,  they  worship.  It  is  all  one,  whether  the  god  is  in  the 
form  of  a  golden  calf,  or  a  doubloon,  so  it  commands  the 
affections.  Jeremiah  says  that  the  stock  is  a  doctrine  of 
vanities.  And  Isaiah  says.  Shall  a  man  be  such  a  fool,  as  to 
fall  down  to  the  stock  of  a  tree  ?  Isaiah's  description  of 
the  heathen  idolatry  is  marveHously  true  of  the  idolatry  of 
wealth.  "  He  burneth  part  thereof  in  the  fire,  with  part 
thereof  he  eateth  flesh  ;  he  roasteth  roast,  and  is  satisfied  ; 
yea,  he  warmeth  himself,  and  saith,  Aha,  I  am  warm,  I 
have  seen  the  fire.  And  the  residue  thereof  he  maketh  a 
god,  even  his  graven  image.  He  falleth  down  unto  it,  and 
worshippeth  it,  and  prayeth  unto  it,  and  saith.  Deliver  me, 
for  thou  art  my  god."  Just  so,  a  man  whose  soul  is  in  his 
wealth,  uses  its  surplus  for  his  appetites,  his  wants,  his 
luxuries,  his  pleasures,  and  saith,  I  am  warm,  I  have  seen 
the  fire ;  and  the  residue  he  maketh  a  god.  His  god  is  his 
great  accumulating  capital.  To  that  he  looks  with  ardent 
worship,  and  he  carries  towards  the  idol  of  his  devotion 
that  entireness,  and  supremacy  of  service  which  in  the 
worship  of  (rod  is  of  infinite  value  ;  an  eye  single. 

I  think,  said  I,  that  you  might  have  found  a  more  pointed 
and  comprehensive  text  than  that,  if  you  had  wished  to 
preach  a  sermon  on  the  love  of  money,  not  to  speak  of  Paul's 
proverbs.     What  is  that  in  Habakkuk  ?    ''  Wo  to  him  that 


62  THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS. 

coveteth  an  evil  covetousness  to  his  house,  that  he  may  set 
his  nest  on  high,  that  he  may  be  delivered  from  the  power 
of  evil." 

Well,  said  my  guide,  this  again  is  but  the  worship  of 
stocks  ;  "  deliver  me,  for  thou  art  my  god."  A  man's 
whole  dependence  in  such  a  case,  is  upon  his  riches ;  these 
being  secured,  he  deems  his  nest  unassailable,  and  dreams 
of  security  from  evil.  "  Because  they  have  no  changes, 
therefore  they  fear  not  God."  This  self-dependence,  this 
dependence  on  gold  and  silver  and  not  on  God,  this  feeling 
of  security,  when  a  man  has  thus  set  hi?  nest  on  high,  and 
become  a  man  of  an  independent  fortune,  is  that  which 
alienates  the  soul  from  God,  diminishes  its  sense  of  de- 
pendence on  him,  nay,  renders  such  a  feeling  insupportable, 
and  makes  the  soul  ready  to  say,  in  regard  to  God,  according 
to  that  true  picture  drawn  in  the  book  of  Job,  Depart  from 
JKHs,  for  we  desire  not  the  knowledge  of  thy  ways.  This  is 
the  reason  why  covetousness  is,  and  is  called,  idolatry. 
This  was  that  idolatry  apparent  in  the  case  of  the  young 
man  with  great  possessions,  to  whom  our  blessed  Lord 
made  known  the  seemingly  severe  condition,  that  if  he 
would  have  a  part  in  the  kingdom  of  heaven,  he  must  sell 
all  that  he  had,  and  give  to  the  poor. 

You  say  seemingly  severe,  said  I ;  was  it  not  really  a 
pretty  hard  and  severe  requisition?  It  is  generally  so 
considered. 

That,  said  my  guide,  depends  upon  the  character.  It 
may  have  been  hard  for  him,  with  his  feelings  and 
habits;  it  may  have  been  hard,  and  without  Christ's  grace 
impossible  for  him  to  comply  with  it,  having  such  a  heart. 
But  as  to  severity,  looked  at  in  the  right  light,  according 
to  the  reality  of  things,  there  was  no  severity  about  it ;  it 
was  an  infinitely  generous  and  easy  condition.  Sell  ? 
Give  ?  Why  I  if  the  globe  had  been  made  of  solid  gold, 
or  had  been  one  entire  and  perfect  chrysolite,  or  diamond, 
wherewith  the  possessor  of  it  might  purchase  the  whole 


THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS. 


6^ 


planetary  system,  and  had  belonged  to  this  young  man,  it 
would  have  been  nothing  to  pay  for  one  yearns  enjoyment 
of  heaven;  but  for  an  eternal  abode  in  heaven,  for  the 
possession  of  the  Spirit  of  heaven,  and  of  life  everlasting 
in  Christ,  the  man's  possessions,  though  they  had  included 
the  temple  itself,  were  not  fit  to  be  named  in  comparison  ; 
they  were  as  flakes  of  dirt,  which  he  might  brush  from  the 
border  of  his  mantle.  Seemingly  severe  ?  What  would 
be  thought  of  a  lawyer  or  merchant,  who,  if  you  offered 
him  the  whole  of  California,  with  all  the  proceeds  of  that 
El  Dorado  for  forty  years  to  come,  in  exchange  for  a  life 
lease  of  his  dingy  office  in  South  street  or  Wall  street, 
should  turn  away  from  you  exceeding  sorrowful  at  so  hard  a 
bargain  ?  An  eternity  of  blessedness  in  exchange  for  that 
man's  houses  in  Jerusalem  or  farms  in  Judea  ?  Why,  if  it 
had  been  a  commercial  ofier,  or  indeed  a  business  transac- 
tion in  any  way,  the  idea  of  severity  in  the  terms  would  be 
infinitely  absurd.  But  in  truth  our  blessed  Lord  was  just 
simply  trying  the  spirit  of  the  man ;  he  would  bring  out, 
to  his  own  view,  the  oovetousness,  the  earthliness,  the 
supremacy  of  self,  in  his  heart.  All  Judea  sold  and  given 
to  the  poor  could  have  been  no  purchase  of  heaven.  But 
the  spirit,  the  temper,  the  heart,  which  should  have  given 
up  all  at  Christ's  suggestion,  and  out  of  love  to  him, 
would  have  been  heaven  itself  And  Christ  showed  him 
that  without  that  spirit,  that  heart,  weaned  from  its  earthly 
treasures,  delivered  from  its  sordid  covetousness,  there  was 
no  place  in  heaven  for  him,  and  no  possibility  of  heaven. 

Our  Lord  saw  that  the  dependence  of  that  young  man, 
notwithstanding  his  religious  education,  was  upon  his 
wealth,  and  not  upon  God,  and  that  until  that  earthly 
dependence  was  taken  away,  his  soul  would  not  come  to 
God.  His  wealth  kept  him  from  God,  and  had  the  entire 
control  of  his  affections,  and  his  wealth  must  be  removed, 
if  he  was  to  be  saved,  unless  his  affections  could  be  re- 
moved from  it ;  if  not,  the  only  hope  in  his  case  would  be 


64  THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS. 

to  take  away  his  wealth,  the  only  beginning  of  a  possi- 
bility of  bringing  him  to  God.  He  wrapped  himself  about 
in  his  wealth,  and  covered  himself  up  in  it,  as  the  stay 
and  preserver  of  his  life  and  happiness,  but  it  kept  him 
out  of  heaven,  it  kept  the  life  of  God  from  being  enkindled 
in  his  soul.  Anything  will  do  this,  on  which  the  heart  is 
fixed  supremely,  and  so  is  kept  from  God.  And  while  this 
is  the  case,  a  man  may  come  in  vain,  even  to  Christ  him- 
self, with  the  inquiry.  Good  Master,  what  good  thing  shall 
I  do  to  inherit  eternal  life  ? 

What  good  thing  ?  Why,  the  whole  current  and  habit 
of  your  soul  must  be  changed,  and  if  you  are  not  ready 
for  that,  you  must  give  up  the  idol  your  soul  is  set  upon, 
or  else  it  must  be  taken  from  you,  or  otherwise  there  is 
no  hope  in  your  case.  The  fire  of  God  can  never  bo 
kindled  within  you  beneath  the  suffocating  weight  of  your 
farms  and  merchandize. 

John  Newton  says  that  he  once  set  out  to  light  a  candle 
with  the  extinguisher  upon  it.  Many  a  man  sets  out  to 
light  the  candle  of  the  Lord  within  him,  as  this  young 
man  did,  with  the  extinguisher  of  wealth  or  pleasure  upon 
it,  or  the  craving  desire  after  wealth  and  pleasure.  He 
must  remove  the  extinguisher.  He  need  not  throw  bis 
wealth  away,  but  he  must  remove  it  from  that  place  in  his 
soul,  or  it  is  idolatry  ;  he  must  remove  it  from  his  affec- 
tions, or  it  stands  between  him  and  God,  it  shuts  him  out 
from  heaven.  A  man  coming  to  light  his  candle  need  not 
throw  away  the  extinguisher,  but  he  must  remove  it.  And 
so  a  man  need  not  absolutely  renounce  or  throw  away  his 
wealth  and  pleasure,  unless,  indeed,  they  have  been  unlaw- 
fully and  fraudulently  gained,  or  are  in  themselves  sinful ; 
but  he  must  cast  them  down  out  of  that  place  in  his  heart 
where  they  have  excluded  God  from  his  affections.  He 
must  be  willing,  should  God  call  for  it,  to  give  up  all  fear 
God.  He  must  give  God  the  first  and  supreme  place  in 
his  existence,  and  must  begin  to  use  his  wealth,  if  he 


THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS.  DO^^ 

already  possesses  it,  for  God,  or  if  he  is  seeking  it,  he  must 
seek  it  as  God's  steward,  God's  servant,  to  do  with  it  the    -^m 
will   of  his  Lord.     No  man  can   serve  two  masters;  fo»^B 
either  he  will  hate  the  one  and  love  the  other,  or  else  he^^^^ 
will  hold  to  the  one,  and  despise  the  other.     Ye  cannot 
serve  God  and  mammon. 

Well,  said  I,  it  is  not  wise  to  make  the  way  of  salva- 
tion harder  than  it  really  is,  nor  to  put  the  forbidding 
things  foremost. 

Why,  said  my  Conductor,  there  are  7io  forbidding  things 
to  be  put  either  foremost  or  hindmost,  if  the  heart  be  right; 
it  is  all  brightness  and  beauty.  True  religion  cannot  have 
less  than  the  whole  heart,  and  it  never  asks  more ;  and 
when  that  is  given,  all  things  are  full  of  ease,  delight,  and 
love.  The  religion  of  the  cross  is  not  a  savage,  morose, 
pleasure-hating,  or  wealth-hating  religion,  but  far  from  it. 
It  is  the  only  religion  that  has  at  heart  the  pleasure,  the 
happiness,  the  true  wealth  of  man.  It  is  a  religion  of  infi- 
nite enjoyment,  joy  unspeakable  and  full  of  glory.  It  is 
not  a  monkish,  gloomy  ascetical  religion,  binding  a  man  to 
poverty  ;  but  one  of  its  very  prayers  is.  Give  me  neither 
poverty  nor  riches.  But  it  does  bind  a  man  to  poverty  of 
spirit,  meekness  and  gentleness  and  lowliness  of  heart, 
which  is  the  true  riches.  It  tells  all  men  that  if  they  be 
lovers  of  pleasure  more  than  lovers  of  God,  they  exclude 
themselves  from  his  kingdom.  It  does  not  despise  money, 
nor  forbid  its  acquisition,  but  it  says  that  the  love  of 
money  is  the  root  of  all  evil.  It  would  sanctify  both  our 
pleasures  and  possessions  by  making  the  love  of  God,  and 
not  of  our  blessings,  supreme  in  the  soul.  It  is  not  a 
religion  that  prevents  or  forbids  a  man  from  enjoying  him- 
self, but  it  shows  him  and  leads  him  into  the  only  possible 
way  whereby  he  can  enjoy  himself.  It  is  a  religion  that 
looks  out  for  his  enjoyment,  makes  that  a  special  object, 
and  prepares  him  for  it,  and  would  prevent  him  from  ren- 
dering it  everlastingly  impossi  ble.    It  is  a  religion  that  will 


6Q  THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS. 

not  let  a  man  take  counsel  at  his  stocks,  because  that  would 
ruin  him,  nor  lean  upon  his  staff,  because  as  a  splintered 
reed  it  would  pierce  him.  It  delivers  him  from  the  feverish 
thirst  and  anxiety  of  pleasure,  by  making  him  happy  in 
God.  A  man  can  enjoy  himself,  only  by  loving  God 
supremely,  only  by  being  delivered  from  the  dominion  of 
selfishness.  He  that  seeketh  his  life  shall  lose  it,  but  he 
that  loseth  his  life  for  Christ's  sake  shall  find  it. 

Ah,  said  I,  if  you  could  make  men  understand  this,  you 
would  gain  a  mighty  point  in  our  world  ;  but  you  cannot 
do  it.  No,  indeed,  said  my  Guide  ;  nothing  but  Divine 
Grace  can  do  it.  And  there  is,  on  this  point,  a  sad  and 
awful  mistake  with  the  children  of  this  world,  and  that  too 
with  some  who  fancy  themselves  far  advanced  on  pilgrim- 
age to  a  better  world.  Read  the  dialogiie  between  Money- 
love,  Hold-the-world,  Save-all,  and  By-ends,  in  the  Pil- 
grim's Progress,  and  you  will  have  a  picture  to  the  life,  of 
the  maxims  of  the  world  brought  into  the  things  of  religion, 
and  the  kind  of  character  thus  formed.  You  will  remem- 
ber that  these  gentlemen  were  the  parties  with  whom 
Christian  and  Hopeful  fell  in,  just  when  in  their  pilgrimage 
they  had  arrived  in  the  neighborhood  of  the  gold-region. 
The  conversation  of  these  men,  and  their  religion  also,  was 
such  as  suited  the  climate  of  the  mines,  such  as  betokened 
the  nearness  and  prevalence  of  some  powerful  temptation. 
They  were  described  in  Paul's  Epistle  to  Timothy  as  men 
of  corrupt  minds,  and  destitute  of  the  truth,  supposing  that 
gain  is  godliness.  The  true  Pilgrims,  Christian  and  Hope- 
ful, had  no  sooner  shaken  off  the  company  of  these  men, 
than  they  came  in  their  journey  upon  a  delicate  plain 
called  Ease  ;  which  plain  is  much  wider  now  than  it  was 
then ;  so  wide,  indeed,  that  thousands  have  settled  there 
on  farms  and  in  villages,  going  for  the  present  no  farther 
in  their  pilgrimage.  At  that  time  the  plain  was  narrow, 
so  that  though  they  travelled  upon  it  with  much  content 
while  it  lasted,  yet  they  quickly  got  over  it. 


THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS.  67^ 

It  may  represent  one  of  those  intervals  of  quiet  and 
sunshine  in  the  condition  of  the  Church  of  God,  which,  by- 
its  temptations  to  the  habit  of  self-indulgence,  puts  the 
Pilgrims  in  danger,  and  but  poorly  prepares  them  for  en- 
countering the  difficulties  and  self-denials  before  them.  In 
our  day,  this  plain  is  broad,  almost  interminably.  And 
though  there  is  an  inscription  on  the  King's  highway  as 
you  pass  through  it,  Wo  to  them  that  are  at  ease  in  Zion, 
yet  a  great  many  are  at  ease,  in  very  various  forms  of  self- 
indulgence  amidst  the  rich  gardens  of  this  plain.  Very 
few  go  straight  over  it  on  the  King's  way.  The  Pil- 
grims, Christian  and  Hopeful,  travelled  on  it  with  much 
content,  while  it  lasted,  but  as  they  did  not  stop  in  their 
pilgrimage  for  the  purpose  of  enjoying  its  comforts,  but 
kept  straight  on,  only  admiring  the  sweet  scenery  by  the 
way,  and  thanking  God  that  they  could  enjoy  it  while 
travelling,  and  that  the  way  of  duty  was  so  sweet  and 
pleasant,  they  soon  got  over  it,  and  must  follow  on,  what- 
ever the  way  might  be  that  came  after  it.  The  spirit  of 
ease  and  self-indulgence  would  have  led  them  to  tarry  for 
a  while  in  the  country  of  ease,  and  to  have  bought,  or  at 
least  hired,  a  pretty  little  cottage  in  the  plain,  where  they 
might  enjoy  life  for  a  season  without  travelling.  But  they 
were  men  of  a  different  spirit.  They  thought  continually 
of  those  sweet  fields  beyond  the  swelling  flood,  at  the  end 
of  their  pilgrimage,  the  everlasting  spring,  the  never- with- 
ering flowers,  the  holy  paradise  of  God.  And  they  heard 
continually  a  voice  behind  them,  saying.  Arise  ye,  and 
depart  hence,  for  this  is  not  your  rest ;  because  it  is  pol- 
luted it  shall  destroy  you,  even  with  a  sore  destruction. 
Dangerous  rest,  indeed,  that  kept  the  mind,  the  thoughts, 
the  heart,  the  feet,  from  heaven.  Anything  is  dangerous 
that  cannot  be  enjoyed  by  the  way,  but  for  which  you  have 
to  stop  in  the  way,  or  to  go  out  of  the  way ;  anything  is 
dangerous  that  stops  you  in  your  pilgrimage,  and  that  you 
cannot  take  along  with  you.     Christian  had  already  gained 


68  THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS. 

some  bitter  experience  in  the  Hill  Difficulty,  as  to  the 
clanger  of  stopping  for  rest ;  thereby  for  a  season  he  lost 
his  roll  of  assurance. 

Well,  at  the  further  side  of  that  Plain  was  a  little  Hill 
called  Lufire^  and  in  that  Hill  a  silver  mine,  which  some 
of  them  that  had  formerly  gone  that  way,  because  of  the 
rarity  of  it,  had  turned  aside  to  see ;  but  going  too  near  the 
brink  of  the  pit,  the  ground  being  deceitful  under  them, 
broke,  and  they  were  slain ;  some  also  were  maimed  there, 
and  could  not,  to  their  dying  day,  be  their  own  men  again. 

I  beseech  you,  mark  that  pregnant  sentence  of  the 
Dreamer  ;  some  ivho  luere  maimed  there^  could  not  to 
their  dying  day  be  their  own  men  again.  There  are  those 
who  know  this  from  experience.  There  are  those  in  whom 
the  light  of  the  Lord  once  shone  sweetly,  brightly,  serenely, 
when  with  a  single  eye,  and  humble,  meek,  unworldly,  af- 
fectionate heart,  they  set  out  on  their  pilgrimage,  full  of 
ardor,  full  of  prayer,  trembling  at  every  danger,  keeping 
near  to  Christ ;  whose  first  real  turning  out  of  this  heavenly 
way  was  a  step  or  two  to  see  these  mines,  and  a  consequent 
desire  and  determination  to  be  rich  at  any  rate.  Then  they 
entered,  and  began  to  dig.  Then  gradually  self,  instead  of 
Christ,  got  uppermost  in  digging,  and  the  spirit  of  the  world 
entered  into  the  heart,  and  the  light  of  the  Lord  became 
less  and  less  in  it.  For  generally  the  diggers  that  stay  in 
those  mines  do  not  dig  by  the  lights  of  heaven, — can  dig 
better  in  the  dark,  indeed,  after  getting  accustomed  to  it. 
So  the  damps  of  the  mines  first  made  the  inward  heavenly 
light  burn  low,  then  it  almost  went  out ;  and  if  the  Pilgrims 
ever  got  back  out  of  the  dungeon,  it  was  with  their  Chris- 
tian hope  almost  extinguished,  their  spirituality  of  mind 
diminished  and  darkened,  their  faith  dim  and  feeble,  the 
seals  of  God's  love  in  Christ,  that  once  shone  so  brightly, 
almost  invisible.  If  they  got  back  at  all,  it  was  only  by 
such  care  and  intercession  of  Christ  for  them,  as  he  made  for 
Peter  on  a  like  occasion,  when  Satan  sifted  him  as  wheat, 


THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS.  69 

and  his  only  salvation  was  by  the  main  force  of  Christ's 
prayer,  /  have  prayed  for  thee^  that  thy  faith  fail  not. 
If  they  got  back  at  all,  it  was  in  such  a  condition,  so 
maimed  and  prostrate,  that  they  could  not  to  their  dying 
day  be  their  own  men  again. 

The  spirit  of  this  world,  the  spirit  of  the  love  of  gain, 
as  also  any  other  besetting  sin,  if  it  once  gets  into  the  heart 
of  the  Christian,  makes  fearful  havoc  with  his  piety.  You 
may  enter  into  the  speculations  of  Demas  with  your  face 
bright  with  the  light  from  the  Celestial  City ;  but  ah,  when 
you  come  back,  if  you  come  back,  what  a  change !  Pale, 
anxious,  foreboding  ;  deep  wounds  of  conscience  within,  and 
the  scars  of  an  enemy  who  has  been  searing  your  conscience, 
while  you  have  been  digging ;  he  has  been  watching  over 
you  with  his  hot  iron ;  perhaps  you  will  be  in  bondage  all 
your  life  long,  and  saved  only  so  as  by  fire.  There  is  a 
deal  of  this  maiming  of  Christians  accomplished  by  the  god 
of  this  world,  in  one  way  and  another,  even  when  he  does 
not  succeed  in  utterly  destroying  them.  They  bear  about, 
not  the  marks  of  the  Lord  Jesus,  but  of  Satan  ;  and  not 
scars  like  Great  Heart's,  received  in  deadly  battle  against 
ApoUyon,  but  scourges  of  his  iron  whip,  while  they  have 
been  digging  for  him,  or  otherwise  indulging  their  own 
passions  in  his  service.  They  cannot,  to  their  dying  day, 
be  their  own  men  again.  Long  neglects  of  prayer,  while 
in  pursuit  of  the  things  of  this  world,  will  of  themselves 
alone  be  sufficient  to  produce  this  mischief  It  is  a  thing 
to  be  most  earnestly  guarded  against.  O  that  we  were  all 
bright  and  shining  lights,  that  a  man  can  walk  by,  read  by, 
run  by,  work  by  ;  bright  and  shining  lights  instead  of  dim, 
ineffectual  hazes,  almost  put  out  by  the  damps  of  the  mines, 
the  clouds  of  damps  hanging  around  them,  and  making  them 
like  gloomy  dim  lamps  in  horn  lanterns.  Hear  what  Christ 
saith.  If  thine  eye  be  single,  thy  whole  body  shall  be  full 
of  light.  Hear  again  what  Christ  saith  about  moth  and 
rust,  and  the  heart  being  where  the  treasure  is.     Hear 


70  THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS. 

likewise  the  saying  of  a  man,  who  possessed  the  gift  of  a 
large  measure  of  the  Spirit  and  the  wisdom  of  Christ,  the 
excellent  Leighton.  A  man,  he  says,  may  drown  himself 
in  a  puddle,  as  well  as  in  the  sea,  if  he  will  down  and  bury 
his  face  in  it.  There  is  no  evil  passion,  though  it  have  but 
a  corner  of  the  heart  for  its  exercise,  but  will  ruin  the  man 
and  his  piety,  if  he  make  it  a  spared  and  darling  lust.  Hear 
the  language  of  a  wise  old  Christian  Poet  on  the  bosom- 
sin  : — 

Lord,  with  what  care  hast  thou  begirt  us  round  ! 

Parents  first  season  us  ;  then  schoolmasters 
Deliver  us  to  laws ;  they  send  us  bound 

To  rules  of  reason,  holy  messengers, 
Pulpits  and  Sundays  ;  sorrow  dogging  sin; 

Afflictions  sorted  ;  anguish  of  all  sizes  ; 
Fine  nets  and  stratagems  to  catch  us  in ; 

Bibles  laid  open  ;  millions  of  surprises ; 
Blessings  beforehand  ;  ties  of  gratefulness ; 

The  sound  of  glory  ringing  in  our  ears  ; 
Without,  our  shame  ;  within,  our  consciences  ; 

Angels  and  grace ;  eternal  hopes  and  fears ! 

Yet  all  these  fences,  and  their  whole  array, 
One  cunning  bosom-sin  blows  quite  away  ! 

Well,  said  I,  the  love  of  money  is  not  the  only  bosom- 
sin,  nor  the  hardest  to  be  conquered.  No,  said  my  guide, 
there  are  other  besetting  sins,  both  tyrannous  and  strong, 
but  this  is  the  most  universal ;  and  often  it  is  the  most 
dangerous  to  those  who  are  the  subjects  of  no  particular 
immoral,  but  darling  appetite  or  lust,  and  in  whose  way 
towards  heaven  there  does  not,  therefore,  seem  to  be  any 
particular  hindrance.  But  let  us  go  on  with  our  survey 
of  this  temptation. 

In  our  day  this  little  Hill  Lucre  has  grown  into  a  great 
mountain,  and  the  silver  mine  has  become  a  gold  mine,  and 
more  than  all  that,  the  god  of  this  world  has  so  altered  the 
ground,  that  instead  of  entering  the  mine  by  deep  pits,  all 
these  evidently  dangerous  shafts  are  now  covered  up,  and  a 


THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS.  71 

man  may  dig  anywhere,  on  apparently  firm  ground,  and 
get  plenty  of  gold  in  the  open  air,  with  only  the  labor  of 
washing  the  dirt  from  it,  in  the  streams  that  issue  from  the 
mountain.  But  whereas  formerly  the  Pilgrims  that  turned 
aside  to  look  at  the  mines  or  to  work  in  them  had  some- 
times fallen  into  the  pits  and  been  slain,  and  sometimes,  if 
they  ever  escaped  with  life,  had  been  so  sadly  bruised  and 
maimed,  or  poisoned  and  sicklied  with  the  unwholesome 
damps,  that  ever  afterwards  they  had  to  go  halting,  and 
with  fearful  hearts,  and  with  great  discomfort  on  their  pil- 
grimage ;  now,  those  that  venture  on  the  mountain  to  dig 
there,  some  of  them  are  carried  off  with  quick  fevers  or  con- 
sumptions, some  get  cramps,  rheumatisms  and  agues,  and 
thence  a  ruined  constitution,  and  just  as  few  are  seen  re- 
gaining the  way  of  their  pilgrimage  as  ever. 

You  will  mark  the  nearness  of  the  Plain  called  Ease  to 
the  region  of  the  mines  with  its  temptations  and  its  dangers. 
When  the  church  has  a  long  period  of  quiet  and  prosperity 
with  the  world,  (and  as  we  have  noticed,  this  Plain  in  our 
day  has  become  very  wide),  the  habits  of  luxury  and  con- 
formity to  the  world  increase,  and  of  course  those  habits 
being  expensive,  greater  means  are  needed  to  keep  them  up. 
Pilgrims  beginning  to  imitate  the  world  and  not  to  lead  it, 
or  to  pass  frugally  through  it,  but  beginning  to  settle  by 
whole  colonies  in  this  Plain  of  Ease,  have  great  want  of 
money  for  themselves  and  their  own  households.  If  Ephraim 
mixes  himself  among  the  people,  not  to  lead  them  to  God, 
but  to  enjoy  their  pleasures,  to  copy  their  fashions,  to  strive 
with  them  in  the  pursuit  of  gain,  and  to  rival  them  in  lux- 
ury, then  Ephraim  must  have  money  to  support  his  own 
establishments.  The  house-rents  in  the  Plain  of  Ease  are 
very  high ;  and  whereas  the  Lord  of  the  way  has  promised 
to  those  who  keep  steady  on  their  pilgrimage  a  protection 
from  its  dangers,  and  a  supply  of  all  their  wants,  he  has 
never  made  any  such  promise  to  those  who  settle  in  that 
Plain,  so  that  they  have  to  look  out  for  themselves  with 


72  THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS. 

just  as  much  eagerness  and  absorbedness  of  soul  in  the 
things  of  this  world,  as  those  who  have  no  God  to  depend 
upon.  They  often  have  to  look  out  for  the  bare  costs  of 
their  living,  with  a  great  deal  more  difficulty  than  they 
could  ever  have  endured  had  they  kept  straight  on  in  their 
pilgrimage.  And  in  many  cases  they  form  the  plan  of  a 
permanent  support  for  their  children  in  that  very  same 
Plain  of  Ease,  where  they  flattered  themselves  at  first  that 
they  were  only  sojourning  for  a  season  ;  and  this  requires 
an  enormous  capital,  and  their  children,  having  no  idea  of 
going  on  pilgrimage,  grow  up  from  beginning  to  end,  in 
habits  of  great  expense  and  self-indulgence.  So  that  those 
who  will  be  rich  in  order  to  keep  up  their  establishments 
in  the  Plain  of  Ease,  besides  the  danger,  and  almost  cer- 
tainty of  drowning  themselves  in  destruction  and  perdition, 
are  often  put  to  the  greatest  and  most  painful  shifts  to  get 
money. 

God's  promises  to  those  who  keep  on,  like  Christian  and 
Hopeful,  in  the  way  of  their  pilgrimage,  are  very  sweet, 
})lentiful  and  precious.  He  makes  a  covenant  of  care,  his 
own  kind  care  and  love,  both  for  themselves  and  their  fam- 
ilies. And  one  of  the  most  experienced  Pilgrims  that  ever 
journeyed  and  reached  home,  once  said,  I  have  been  young, 
and  now  am  old ;  yet  have  I  never  seen  the  righteous  for- 
saken, nor  his  seed  begging  bread.  It  is  true  that  the 
advice  of  another  great  Pilgrim,  still  more  experienced, 
because  under  a  dispensation  of  greater  light,  for  those  who 
goon  pilgrimage,' seems  somewhat  strict.  '^  Having  food 
and  raiment,  let  us  be  therewith  content."  He  does  not 
command  that  a  Pilgrim  never  have  anything  else,  but  he 
advises,  and  it  is  sweet  and  loving  advice,  that  if  we  be 
reduced  simply  to  that,  food  and  raiment,  we  be  quiet  and 
content.  And  truly,  a  contented  mind  is  better  than  great 
riches.  And  after  all,  what  more  than  this  allotment  of 
Paul,  with  a  contented  mind,  does  any  man  really  need  on 
the  way  of  his  pilgrimage  ?     And  if  God  secures  this  for 


THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS.  73 

himself  and  his  family,  and  heaven  at  the  end,  is  he  not  an 
infinitely  kind,  gracious,  and  most  indulgent  God  ?  Does 
any  master  ever  give  more  than  this,  support  by  the  way, 
and  large  wages  when  the  work  is  done  ? 

God  says.  Make  you  my  service  your  delight,  your  wants 
shall  be  my  care.  Seek  first  the  kingdom  of  God  and  his 
righteousness,  and  all  these  things  shall  be  added  unto  you. 
But  on  the  other  hand  he  says,  If  you  stop  in  the  Plain  of 
Ease,  you  will  have  to  take  care  of  yourself;  and  if  that 
becomes  your  supreme  business,  you  are  lost ;  if  you  seek 
this  world  for  yourself,  you  will  have  to  hire  yourself  out 
to  the  god  of  this  world,  and  doing  this,  you  will  receive 
the  wages  of  his  services,  and  none  other  ;  and  the  wages 
of  sin  is  death.  Doing  this,  you  will  probably,  in  some 
shape  or  another,  go  digging  in  the  mines,  in  order  to  gain 
the  means  of  maintaining  your  support  in  the  Plain  of 
Ease.  Your  wants,  your  expenses,  in  the  Plain  of  Ease, 
are  incomparably  greater  than  those  on  the  way  of  your 
pilgrimage.  Besides,  they  are  wants  for  yourself,  not  for 
God,  and  so  you  go  to  the  mines  for  yourself,  not  for  him  ; 
and  if  that  be  the  rule  of  your  life,  then  you  come  under 
the  dread,  withering,  but  immutable  law  of  selfishness,  He 
that  seeketh  his  life,  shall  lose  it.  Alas  !  a  man  had  better 
be  involved  in  the  smoke,  perplexities  and  terrors  of  the 
valley  of  the  shadow  of  death,  all  his  life-time,  than  be  under 
such  a  law  of  life,  such  a  despotism  of  death  in  life. 

Oh,  as  we  said  before,  if  a  man  be  not  set  free  from  self, 
he  never  can  enjoy  himself;  and  nothing  but  God's  kind 
love,  in  Christ's  blessed  service,  can  possibly  set  him  free. 
But,  let  him  only  throw  himself  on  Christ,  and  by  his  grace 
set  out  on  the  way  of  this  pilgrimage  with  great  earnest- 
ness, let  him  get  absorbed  intently  in  Christ's  service,  and 
he  will  forget  his  own  ;  and  thus  Christ  sets  him  free,  in 
making  him  so  sweetly  forgetful  of  self,  and  absorbed  in 
Christ.  All  his  service  for  self,  is  service  for  Christ.  The 
law  of  the  spirit  of  life  in  Christ  Jesus  shall  be  felt  through 
"^  4 


** 


74  THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS. 

his  whole  being,  setting  him  free  from  the  law  of  sin  and 
of  death.  In  general,  it  may  be  said  that  self  is  a  dog  or  a 
wolf  that  keeps  watch  over  you  ;  it  is  only  by  setting  him 
at  work  for  others,  that  you  can  escape  from  him  yourself. 
Now  the  Plain  of  Ease  being  so  near  the  mines,  and  the 
King's  highway  running  for  a  longer  or  shorter  season 
through  the  Plain,  it  makes  a  great  temptation  for  the 
Pilgrims  that  straggle  variously,  and  do  not  keep  narrowly 
in  the  way.  But  you  will  observe  that  the  mines  them- 
selves are  out  of  the  way,  even  though  the  Plain  of  Ease 
was  in  the  way.  And  it  is  the  maxims  and  men  of  the 
world,  and  not  the  wants  of  our  Pilgrimage,  that  call  the 
Pilgrims'  attention  to  the  mines,  and  urge  them  to  turn  in 
thither.  "  Then  I  saw  in  my  dream,  that  a  httle  off  the 
road,  over  against  the  silver  mine,  stood  Demas,  gentleman- 
like, to  call  to  passengers  to  come  and  see  ;  who  said  to 
Christian  and  his  fellow,  Ho !  turn  aside  hither,  and  I  will 
show  you  a  thing."  Well,  certainly,  the  silver  mine  or  the 
gold  mine,  whether  the  land  be  Lucre  or  Beulah,  is  always 
a  little  off  the  road  ;  the  first  temptations  to  it  are  a  little 
off  the  road;  and  here  stood  Demas,  a  little  off  the  roady 
and  the  first  word  was,  merely.  Come  and  see ;  no  great 
evil  in  that,  surely.  No,  certainly,  none  at  all.  The 
blessed  creatures  in  heaven  cry.  Come  and  see,  at  God's 
wonders  ;  and  the  Angel  of  the  Gospel  on  earth  cries.  Come 
and  see.  But  when  the  god  of  this  world  imitates  the 
voice,  for  his  shows  and  lying  wonders,  it  is  a  different 
thing.  The  world  run  to  the  door,  run  into  the  streets,  but 
it  is  Death  and  hell  following  with  him.  Come  and  see, 
says  Demas  ;  can  there  be  any  harm  in  that  ?  No  !  but  it 
is  off  the  road,  and  while  you  look,  you  are  entering  into 
temptation^  doing  that  against  which  our  Lord  directs  you 
to  pray  earnestly,  because  it  is  the  first  step  towards  ruin. 
While  you  look,  the  cloud  is  around  you,  and  the  spirit  of 
the  wonder  enters  into  you.     It  is  as  the  deadly  fascination 


♦  * 


THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS.  75 

of  the  snake ;  it  holds  you  with  its  glittering  eye,  and  you 
gaze  till  you  become  dizzy. 

It  is  dangerous  even  to  contemplate  successful,  sudden 
riches.  While  you  look,  you  envy,  you  thirst.  The  very 
first  temptation  in  Paradise  was.  Come  and  see.  Eve 
looked  at  the  mellow,  tempting,  golden  fruit,  and  looked 
again,  and  was  lost.  The  voice  Come  and  see,  is  sometimes 
dangerous  enough  even  in  the  very  path  of  our  Pilgrim- 
age; but  off  the  road,  beware.  Our  blessed  Lord  says 
the  cares  of  life  and  the  deceitfulness  of  riches  choke  the 
word.  Surely  there  is  nothing  sinful  in  the  cares  of  life ; 
no,  certainly  not,  if  you  meet  them  with  patience ;  but  if 
they  choke  the  word,  what  then  ?  And  riches,  there  is 
nothing  evil  in  riches,  unless  got  by  wrong.  No,  but  the 
deceitfulness  of  riches,  their  dominion  over  the  heart,  their 
idolatrous,  absorbing  power,  that  is  the  danger.  And  hasty 
riches  are  very  different  from  riches  gradually  gained  by 
honest  industry.  He  that  maketh  haste  to  be  rich  shall 
not  be  innocent.  Riches  may  increase,  by  God's  provi- 
dence, even  in  the  way  of  this  Pilgrimage  ;  but  God's  di- 
rection is,  if  they  increase,  set  not  your  heart  upon  them. 
And  Christ's  memorable  words  are  never  to  be  forgotten, 
never  can  be  forgotten :  It  is  easier  for  a  camel  to  go  through 
the  eye  of  a  needle  than  for  a  rich  man  to  enter  into  the 
kingdom  of  heaven. 

Aye,  says  one,  but  our  Lord  explained  his  meaning 
when  he  said,  How  hard  is  it  for  them  that  trust  in  riches 
to  enter  into  the  kingdom  of  heaven.  Very  true.  But 
why  did  he  put  it  in  the  other  form  first,  and  not  make 
the  correction  till  the  blank  astonishment  of  his  disciples 
at  that  saying  induced  him  ?  And  indeed  it  was  to  their 
ears  the  most  astounding  incredible  proposition  they  had 
ever  heard  from  his  lips.  He  put  it  in  that  blank,  unexcep- 
tive  form,  because  in  all  ages  it  is  the  nature  of  riches  to 
make  men  trust  in  them,  and  ninety-nine  out  of  a  hundred 


76  THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS. 

do  trust  in  them,  and  with  all  possible  caution  and  good 
use  they  are  very  hazardous  to  a  man's  salvation. 

But  you  may  perhaps  say  again,  Was  not  Joseph  of  Ari- 
mathea  a  rich  man  ?  And  was  not  Zaccheus  a  rich  man  ? 
And  was  not  Philemon  a  rich  man  ?  And  does  not  God 
give  particular  charges  to  rich  men  as  Christians  ?  And  did 
not  Peter  and  John  both  own  houses  in  Jerusalem  ?  And 
does  not  Paul  say  that  if  any  man  provideth  not  for  his  own 
he  hath  denied  the  faith  and  is  worse  than  an  infidel  ?  And 
if  we  merchants  were  all  to  turn  preachers,  and  let  our  busi- 
ness go  at  loose  ends,  where  would  be  your  monies  for  the 
Missionary  Enterprise  ? 

Well,  that  is  all  true.  But  did  any  of  them,  in  disobe- 
dience of  Christ's  warning,  lay  up  riches  for  themselves^ 
setting  their  hearts  upon  them  ?  Were  they  not  all  acting 
as  God's  stewards  ?  And  does  not  Paul  charge  them  that 
are  rich  in  this  world  that  they  be  rich  in  good  works,  will- 
ing to  communicate,  that  is,  to  give  abundantly?  It  is 
very  true  that  God  nowhere  forbids  men  to  become  rich, 
but  he  does  forbid  their  becoming  rich  for  themselves,  for 
that  is  idolatry.  We  mast  have  reservoirs  of  water  ;  but 
for  what  ?  Are  the  reservoirs  to  keep  the  water  for  them- 
selves ?  No,  but  to  have  it  flow  out  as  fast  as  it  flows  in. 
If  it  does  not  flow  out,  it  becomes  stagnant.  And  just  so 
with  wealth.  If  God  permits  it  to  accumulate,  permits  a 
man  to  become  a  reservoir  of  it,  and  a  man  undertakes  to 
legislate  over  it  for  himself,  and  to  keep  it  for  himself,  it  is 
sure  to  stagnate  ;  it  breeds  reptiles  in  the  man's  character, 
and  the  miserly  surface  shall  cream  and  mantle  with  cor- 
ruption. 

In  that  creaming  and  mantling,  a  man  may  think  that 
he  sees  nothing  but  gay  and  beautiful  colors  and  flowers  ; 
theatres,  operas,  rich  magnificent  dresses  and  furniture,  del- 
icacies for  the  appetite,  dinners  with  costly  wines,  mas- 
querades, and  dances,  the  lusts  of  the  flesh,  the  pride  of  the 
eye  and  the  pride  of  life  ;  but  if  these  are  what  floats  up 


THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS.  77 

for  a  man's  worship  out  of  the  reservoir  of  his  wealth,  the 
most  nauseous  toad-stool  of  God's  making  on  the  surface 
of  the  mould  of  the  forest,  or  any  handful  of  the  green 
slime  upon  a  stagnant  pond,  were  full  of  radiant  beauty 
and  worth  in  the  comparison.  Indeed  it  is  a  wrong  done 
to  any  of  God's  things,  though  they  were  but  leaves  rotting 
by  the  roadside,  to  compare  men's  selfish  passions  to  them  ; 
for  the  things  that  rot  do  it  in  obedience  to  God's  laws,  and 
there  is  a  divine  force  in  them  that  makes  them  rot,  and 
they  die  to  accomplish  God's  purposes.  But  the  corruption 
of  a  man's  passions,  the  activity  of  his  animal  and  earthly 
propensities,  in  utmost  self-gratification  and  indulgence,  is 
the  gangrene  and  death  of  his  spiritual  being.  The  turn- 
ing of  God's  bounties  into  the  mere  kindling  stuff  and  fuel 
of  those  fires  that  shall  drive  the  man's  soul,  as  a  fierce 
engine  of  death,  away  from  God,  what  is  that  ?  what  name 
can  be  given  to  that  ? 

A  reservoir  of  wealth,  or  of  any  gifts  that  might  be  used 
for  God,  stolen  from  him,  and  put  under  lock  and  key  for 
self,  self-aggrandizement,  self-indulgence,  family-aggrandize- 
ment, worldly  purposes,  and  things  that  perish  in  the  using, 
is  a  fountain  of  guilt,  and  will  be  of  misery  to  those  who 
thus  apply  it.  But  let  it  flow  forth  as  God  intended,  and 
it  shall  be  pure,  sweet,  healthful,  blessing  both  the  giver  and 
receiver.  Let  the  stream  of  God's  bounty,  grace,  and  love 
flow  into  it  and  through  it,  and  it  shall  never  stagnate,  but 
the  bright,  rippling,  central  current,  that  gives  it  motion  and 
purpose,  shall  keep  it  ever  fresh,  pure,  beautiful. 

Moreover,  that  current  is  a  self-regulating  power  for  the 
ebb  and  flow  of  the  whole  reservoir.  The  measures  of  a 
man's  charities,  since  Christ  Jesus,  the  Incarnation  and 
Example  of  divine  benevolence  came  into  the  world,  are 
not  determined  by  legal  calculation  and  appointment,  but 
are  the  work  of  willing,  sanctified  affections.  Every  man 
as  he  findeth  in  his  heart,  and  as  God  hath  prospered  him, 
so  let  him  give,  remembering  the  words  of  the  Lord  Jesus, 


78  THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS. 

how  he  said,  It  is  more  blessed  to  give  than  to  receive. 
The  greatest  prosperity  that  a  man  can  have  from  God  is 
the  gift  of  a  heart  that  loves  to  give.  Under  the  old  Dis- 
pensation almost  everything  was  ordered  by  law  ;  but  what 
God  began  by  law  he  carries  on  and  perfects  by  grace. 
Whereas  under  the  old  legal  Dispensation  it  was  a  law  to 
give  the  tenth  part  of  one's  income  to  the  Lord,  under  the 
new  dispensation  all  giving  was  a  voluntary  thing.  And 
certainly  God  ought  to  get  more  by  grace  than  he  does  by 
law,  though  whether  it  be  so  or  not,  in  particular  cases,  we 
cannot  tell.  But  in  truth  by  grace  he  gets,  or  will  get,  all ; 
for  grace  shall  conquer  all ;  and  so  a  man  who,  like  the  old 
Pharisee,  gave  tithes  of  all  that  he  possessed,  and  then 
rested  on  that  as  a  legal  justification,  did,  on  becoming  a 
Christian,  give  all  to  God,  to  be  used  for  him,  as  his  stew- 
ard, instead  of  merely  giving  a  legal  part,  and  then  saying, 
all  the  rest  is  mine.  It  is  manifest  that  a  man  who  had 
complied  strictly  with  the  terms  of  the  law,  in  giving  his 
tithes,  might  be  just  as  covetous  as  ever  in  regard  to  all 
the  rest;  but  a  man  under  grace  has  the  covetousness 
itself  broken  up,  and  feels  that  all  is  the  Lord's,  and  only 
lent  to  himself  for  a  little  season,  to  use  for  the  Lord,  and 
do  good  with  as  he  has  opportunity,  do  good  by  voluntary 
gifts,  gifts  by  grace,  not  mere  law.  Every  man  cheerfully, 
according  as  God  hath  prospered  him,  for  God  loveth  a 
cheerful  giver.  It  is  one  of  the  very  remarkable  things  in 
the  change  from  the  old  dispensation  to  the  new,  that 
whereas  the  tithe  law  of  benevolence  was  abolished,  the 
law  of  a  tenth  part  of  every  one's  property  devoted  to 
God,  no  new  law  was  put  in  its  place.  It  was  because 
God  was  then  setting  up  the  voluntary  system,  and  would 
carry  everything  by  grace,  and  heartfelt,  cheerful,  happy 
love. 

Now  let  us  compare  with  this  view,  a  few  passages  in 
God's  Word  intimately  connected  with  it.  It  is  of  great 
importance  that  we  have,  as  far  as  possible,  a  comparison  of 


THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS.  79 

all  the  sides  of  our  subject,  as  presented  in  God's  wisdom. 
'*  Concerning  the  works  of  men,  by  the  word  of  thy  lips  I 
have  kept  me  from  the  paths  of  the  Destroyer." 

The  first  passage  shall  be  from  the  Epistle  to  the  Ephe- 
sians.  "  Let  him  that  stole  steal  no  more,  but  rather  let 
him  labor,  working  with  his  hands  the  thing  which  is  good, 
that  he  may  have  to  give  to  him  that  needeth^  Note,  in 
this  passage,  the  reason  by  which  the  habit  of  honest  in- 
dustry is  enforced  upon  the  man,  namely,  that  instead  of 
being  under  the  necessity  of  demanding  help,  he  may  have 
to  give  to  him  that  needeth.  The  second  shall  be  from 
the  Epistle  to  the  Thessalonians.  ^'  Study  to  be  quiet, 
and  to  do  your  own  business,  and  to  work  with  your  own 
hands,  as  we  commanded  you  ;  that  ye  may  walk  honestly 
towards  them  that  are  without,  and  that  ye  may  have  lack 
of  nothing. — For  even  when  we  were  with  you,  this  we 
commanded  you,  that  if  any  would  not  work,  neither 
should  he  eat.  For  we  hear  that  there  are  some  which 
walk  among  you  disorderly,  working  not  at  all,  but 
are  busy-bodies.  Now  them  that  are  such  we  command 
and  exhort  by  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  that  with  quietness 
they  work,  and  eat  their  own  bread."  "  But  if  any  pro- 
vide not  for  his  own,"  continues  the  apostle  to  Timothy, 
*'  and  especially  for  those  of  his  own  house,  he  hath  denied 
the  faith,  and  is  worse  than  an  infidel."  In  the  Epistle  to 
the  Romans  he  commands  that  we  owe  no  man  anything, 
but  to  love  one  another,  and  that  we  be  not  slothful  in 
business,  but  fervent  in  spirit,  serving  the  Lord.  To  the 
same  general  purport  the  injunction  in  Titus  is  given  to  all 
Christians,  that  they  learn  to  maintain  good  works  for 
necessary  uses,  that  they  be  not  unfruitful ;  a  passage 
which  is  supposed  to  enjoin  a  constant  diligence  in  busi- 
ness for  the  purpose  of  a  systematic  benevolence. 

A  man  will  not  fail  to  note  here  the  practical  wisdom 
and  beauty  of  Christianity,  and  the  unparalleled  loftiness 
of  its  motives,  as  revealed  in  these  passages.     The  main 


BO  THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS. 

argument  by  which  an  industrious  attention  to  business  is 
urged  upon  men,  is  that  they  may  themselves  possess  the 
ability  and  exercise  the  habit,  and  enjoy  the  happiness  of 
giving  to  those  who  have  need.  There  are  no  extremes 
here,  no  impracticable  separations  between  a  man's  business 
and  his  piety ;  but  his  business  is  to  be  pursued  as  a  part 
and  for  the  sake  of  his  piety.  You  are  not  commanded  to 
turn  aside  from  the  pursuits  of  this  world,  to  renounce 
them,  and  to  go  about  preaching  or  praying  as  your  only 
business ;  but  you  are  to  serve  God  in  your  own  calling, 
and  to  pursue  that  industriously  as  a  part  of  your  religion. 
You  are  to  trust  in  God,  but  you  are  to  help  yourself. 
You  are  to  labor  for  your  own  support  and  that  of  your 
family.  And  you  are  to  do  this,  not  to  gain  a  mere  support 
for  them  and  yourself,  but  to  be  able  also,  if  need  be,  to 
supply  the  wants  of  others.  You  are  to  work  with  all  your 
energy,  in  an  honest  way,  for  an  honest  competence.  You 
arc  to  do  this,  not  only  that  you  may  not  be  compelled  to 
tax  the  charity  of  others  for  your  support,  but  that  you 
may  have  a  surplus  to  give  to  the  needy.  If,  after  you 
have  done  your  uttermost,  trusting  in  God  to  gain  your  own 
livelihood,  and  also  the  ability  to  give  to  others,  you  are 
still  poor,  it  is  not  your  fault.  God's  discipline  is  upon 
you.  But  poverty  is  sin,  if  you  are  not  using  your  utmost 
honest  diligence  to  avoid  it. 

Furthermore,  ene  cannot  but  mark  here  the  honorable- 
ness  of  labor,  manual  labor,  in  the  Bible.  Whatever  sys- 
tem of  slavery  there  might  have"been  then  in  existence,  it 
was  not  one  that  made  industry  and  labor  dishonorable. 
That  infamous  degradation,  or  power  of  degradation,  was 
reserved  for  the  system  of  modern  times.  Paul  himself 
has  been  marked  as  one  of  the  most  perfect  gentlemen  the 
world  ever  saw,  but  he  labored,  working  with  his  own 
hands.  He  gained  his  livelihood  by  manual  labor.  Your 
professed  gentlemen  who  refuse  this,  when  necessary,  or 
regard  it  as  dishonorable,  or  not  respectable,  deeming  idle- 


THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS.  81 

ness  a  characteristic  of  gentility,  are  stamped  by  Paul, 
singularly  enough,  as  busy-bodies,  working  not  at  all ; 
dishonorably  busy,  but  not  honorably  working.  The  praise 
of  labor  in  God's  Word,  the  honor  put  upon  every  employ- 
ment of  honest  industry,  and  the  striking  down  of  all  dis- 
tinctions between  rich  and  poor,  except  those  of  goodness, 
are  characteristics  of  a  divine  revelation. 

But  if  you  are  commanded  to  be  diligent  in  business, 
you  are  to  do  it  always  as  serving  the  Lord.  In  all 
things  you  must  have  God  and  your  duty  to  him  in  view, 
and  that  redeems  every  pursuit  from  selfishness  and  earth - 
liness,  and  dignifies  every  act  of  life,  every  labor  of  society, 
with  the  beauty  of  religion.  The  law  of  true  piety  is  that 
you  pursue  your  honest  callings  in  obedience  to  God,  and 
whatever  you  do,  do  it  as  to  him.  There  is  no  necessary 
act  or  employment  so  poor  and  low,  as  not  to  come  within 
not  merely  the  possibility,  but  the  obligation  of  this  rule  ; 
no  position  in  life  so  obscure  or  painful,  that  may  not, 
throughout,  be  irradiated  with  celestial  light. 

Teach  me,  my  God  and  King, 

In  all  things  thee  to  see  ; 
And  what  I  do  in  anything 

To  do  it  as  for  thee. 

All  may  of  thee  partake : 

Nothing  can  be  so  mean 
Which  with  this  tincture,  For  thy  sake, 

Will  not  grow  bright  and  clean. 

A  servant  with  this  clause 

Makes  drudgery  divine ; 
Who  sweeps  a  room,  as  for  God's  laws, 

Makes  that  and  the  action  fine. 

All  these  texts  and  principles  lead  us  to  the  grand  prin- 
ciple of  love  recorded  by  Paul  in  that  sweet  remembered 
declaration  of  Christ,  "It  is  more  blessed  to  give  than  to 
receive."  And  this  is  a  declaration  from  the  very  depths 
of  heaven,  and  carries  the  spirit  and  the  happiness  of  hea- 
ven with  it. 

4* 


82  THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS. 

For  it  is  entirely  true  that  when  we  are  exercising  our- 
selves in  habits  of  benevolence,  when  we  are  thus,  under 
God's  grace,  building  up  a  giving  and  compassionate 
nature,  we  are,  if  I  may  dare  so  to  speak,  just  helping  God 
to  conquer  and  destroy  that  which  keeps  us  out  of  heaven, 
our  own  selfishness.  And  after  the  example  of  Paul,  I 
think  we  may  dare  so  to  speak,  for  he  represents  Chris- 
tians as  being,  in  this  work,  fellow- workers  with  God, 
according  to  God's  working.  When  a  man  of  wealth, 
amidst  all  the  great  dangers  and  temptations  with  which 
he  is  surrounded,  steadily  pursues  his  path  for  God,  and 
forms,  under  God's  grace,  the  rule  of  large  giving  according 
to  his  large  means,  he  is  anchoring  himself  in  God  and 
heaven  ;  he  is  just  fastening  safety-drags  on  that  immortal 
soul  of  his,  which,  laden  by  the  god  of  this  world  with  the 
stuff  of  this  world,  was  fiercely  rushing  down  an  inclined 
plane  to  ruin.  Everything  that  he  throws  out  for  God  and 
his  fellow-beings,  has  a  grappling-iron  that  holds  fast,  and 
checks  his  progress.  Let  him  continue  to  give,  till  his 
heart  has  formed  the  habit  of  giving,  till  by  God's  grace 
he  can  begin  to  be  able  to  say  from  his  own  experience,  It 
is  more  blessed  so  give  than  to  receive ;  and  although  the 
god  of  this  world  thinks  he  is  sure  of  his  destruction  on 
this  inclined  plane,  yet  he  shall  come  to  the  bottom  safe. 
It  is  a  blessed  discipline  for  the  soul,  that  of  giving.  A 
man  thinks  he  is  doing  good  to  others,  but  he  is  doing 
infinitely  the  most  good  to  himself.  In  the  barest  literal 
reality  of  things,  it  is  more  blessed  to  give  than  to  receive. 
Take  the  miserable  theory  of  mere  utilitarianism,  which  is 
the  very  lowest  point  to  which  man  or  devil  can  get  down 
in  theory-making  ;  go  upon  the  material  dry  goods  trafl[ic, 
of  quid  pro  quo,  and  every  man  who  truly  gives,  receives 
infinitely  more  than  he  gives. 

Even  leaving  out  of  view  the  heavenliness,  the  divine 
beatitude  and  celestial  state  of  the  affections  in  the  act  of 
giving,  which  makes  it  positively,  and  at  present,  and  with- 


THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS.  83 

out  any  regard  to  results  or  consequences,  a  sweeter,  more 
delightful,  more  blessed  exercise  to  give  than  to  receive, 
that  being  the  very  triumph  of  love,  the  very  spirit  of 
heaven  to  realize  this  ;  leaving  that  all  out  of  view,  and 
speaking  only  of  the  effect  of  giving,  as  a  discipline  upon 
the  soul  of  the  giver,  and  of  the  compound  interest  of  profit 
which  is  sure  to  return  to  him  from  his  gift,  it  is  more 
profitable  to  give  than  to  receive  ;  a  man  lays  up  more  by 
giving  than  he  does  by  receiving.  There  is  that  giveth 
and  yet  increaseth  ;  here  is  that  arithmetic,  not  figures  of 
speech,  but  figures  of  realities,  by  which  it  is  demonstrable 
that  the  more  a  man  gives,  the  more  he  has,  the  richer  he 
is.  It  is  better  for  him  to  give  than  it  is  to  receive.  You 
cannot  make  a  selfish  world  or  heart  believe  this,  because 
selfishness  cannot  understand,  feel,  believe,  the  higher, 
heavenly,  absolute  ground,  on  which  eternally  it  is  true 
that  it  is  more  blessed  to  give  than  to  receive.  It  is  the 
province  of  creatures  to  receive  ;  (3rod  only  can  be  said 
absolutely  to  give ;  it  is  God's  prerogative  to  give,  man's 
only  to  receive.  Therefore,  every  man  who  truly  gives 
becomes  like  God.  The  exercise  of  giving  is  blessed  be- 
cause it  is  God's  exercise.  The  man  who  loves,  blesses, 
gives,  is  the  child  of  his  Father  in  heaven  ;  and  it  is  from 
the  very  heart  of  Incarnate  Love,  of  God  Incarnate,  that 
this  divine  utterance  comes,  not  in  reference  to  results, 
rewards,  or  consequences,  but  in  present  and  eternal  reality 
and  absolutism.  It  is  more  blessed  to  give  than  to  receive. 
When  a  man  can  repeat  that  utterance  from  the  heart,  he 
is  a  changed  man,  a  regenerated  man,  a  new  creature. 
Heaven  is  begun  in  him  ;  he  is  a  aaved  man,  for  Christ  is 
formed  in  him  the  hope  of  glory,  and  it  is  from  Christ's 
grace,  Christ's  teachings,  that  he  learned  that  utterance. 

Now  in  regard  to  all  heavenly  utterances  it  is  true  that 
our  learning  of  them,  our  ability  to  repeat  them,  begins 
with  lame,  imperfect  efforts.  We  first  command  only 
single  letters,  then  we  read  words  of  one,  then  of  two, 


84  THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS. 

then  of  three  syllables,  till  at  length  the  whole  sentence 
pours  forfh  from  the  triumph  of  grace  in  the  heart,  like  a 
whole  anthem  from  a  mighty  church  organ.  This  is  the 
way  we  learn  the  exercise  of  heavenly  love,  and  come  to 
say  from  experience,  It  is  more  blessed  to  give  than  to  re- 
ceive. Perhaps  many  acts  of  mere  duty  in  giving,  many 
mere  obediences  to  the  conscience,  almost  out  of  the  bond- 
age of  fear,  will  have  to  be  performed,  before  the  words  of 
this  great  utterance  can  be  spelled  out  as  angels  read  them. 
Before  it  can  be  repeated  by  hearty  there  will  have  to  be 
many  attempts  at  repetition,  as  a  lesson.  And  every  man 
should  be  at  work  upon  this  lesson,  every  rich  man  especially. 
Poor  men  seem  to  learn  it  more  easily,  and  alas,  often  un- 
learn it,  in  a  measure,  in  proportion  as  they  gi*ow  rich.  A 
rich  man  is  under  God's  own  training,  when  he  is  learning 
this  lesson  ;  indeed  rich  or  poor,  that  is  the  case.  It  is  the 
lesson  of  heaven  that  we  all  must  learn,  if  we  would  ever 
be  happy,  the  lesson  of  self-denying  love. 

But  now  let  us  see  what  was  done  with  Demas'  invita- 
tion. It  is  rather  a  singular  station  that  Bunyan  has  given 
to  this  gentleman,  who,  you  are  aware,  was  at  one  time 
one  of  Paul's  companions  and  fellow-laborers  ;  but  here  we 
find  him  acting  as  the  overseer  of  this  silver  mine.  A 
very  courteous,  fine-spoken,  gentlemanly  man,  inviting  the 
Pilgrims  to  come  and  see.  We  can  see  Demas,  if  we  can- 
not see  the  mines.  Some  may  think  Bunyan  has  dealt 
hardly  with  Demas,  in  placing  him  here  ;  but  Paul  is  very 
clear.  Demas  hath  forsaken  me,  having  loved  this  present 
ivorld.  Most  likely,  the  dangers  that  were  then  thicken- 
ing around  Paul,  in  the  work  of  the  ministry,  acting  con- 
jointly with  some  tempting  offer  of  advantage  in  business, 
drew  Demas  away,  and  we  see  him  no  more,  till  we  meet 
him  here  at  the  mouth  of  this  mine,  calling  to  the  Pilgrims, 
Ho,  turn  aside  hither,  and  I  will  show  you  a  thing.  If 
Demas  still  kept  his  profession  of  Christianity,  we  suppose 
the  god  of  this  world  was  very  glad  to  get  a,  p^rofessqr  oj. 


THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS.  85 

religion  to  act  in  this  capacity  in  the  mining  speculation. 
It  gave  increased  dignity  and  respectability  to  the  whole 
thing,  and  doubtless  there  were  many  professors  of  religion 
in  the  plain  of  Ease  well  acquainted  with  Demas,  and  who 
had  made  investments  in  the  mines,  and  committed  the 
main  care  of  their  stocks  to  him.  He  was  a  gentlemanly 
man  at  any  rate.  But  then  he  had  to  say,  Tur7i  aside 
hither ;  and  of  that  word  Turn  aside  Christian  just  now 
was  very  fearful ;  and  before  he  had  gone  much  farther  on 
his  pilgrimage  he  wished  he  had  all  the  way  continued  as 
fearful.     Now  he  is  on  his  guard. 

What  thing,  says  Christian,  so  deserving  as  to  turn  us 
out  of  the  way  ? 

Why,  says  Demas,  here  is  a  silver  mine,  and  some 
digging  in  it  for  treasure ;  if  you  will  come,  with  a  little 
pains  you  may  richly  provide  for  yourselves.  It  is  open  to 
every  one,  no  tax,  no  monopoly,  and  nothing  to  do  but  dig. 
Now  the  youngest  of  the  Pilgrims  was  somewhat  tempted 
at  this  offer.  He  thought  they  might  at  least  go  and  ex- 
amine the  ground ;  he  had  just  then  forgotten  the  words, 
Pray  that  ye  enter  not  into  temptation.  Then  said  Hope- 
ful, let  us  go  and  see.  If  Hopeful  had  been  alone  in  the 
pilgrimage,  he  had  gone ;  but  two  are  better  than  one  ; 
and  the  Lord  of  the  way  kept  him  from  destruction  by 
means  of  his  fellow-pilgrim.  Not  I,  said  Christian,  I  have 
heard  of  this  place  before  now,  and  how  many  have  there 
been  slain ;  and  besides,  that  treasure  is  a  snare  to  those 
that  seek  it ;  for  it  hindereth  them  in  their  pilgrimage. 
Then  Christian  called  to  Demas,  saying,  Is  not  the  way 
dangerous  ?  hath  it  not  hindered  many  in  their  pilgrimage  ? 

Then  answered  Demas,  Not  very  dangerous,  except  to 
those  that  are  careless.  But  withal  he  blushed  as  he  spoke. 
Not  very  dangerous.  Demas  could  not  make  up  his  mind 
to  say,  Not  at  all.  Even  those  whose  souls  are  most  ab- 
sorbed with  wealth  are  perfectly  willing  to  admit  that  the 
pursuit  of  it  is  fuU  of  danger,  but  then  so  is  everything, 


86  THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS. 

they  say,  and  a  man  must  take  care  of  himself.  But  De- 
mas  knew  something  from  experience,  which  he  did  not 
care  to  tell. 

Now  these  men,  Money-love,  By-ends,  Save-all,  and 
Hold-the- world,  were  but  a  little  distance  behind  Christian 
and  Hopeful.  I  will  warrant  you,  said  Hopeful,  when  By- 
ends  comes  up,  if  he  hath  the  same  invitation  as  we,  he 
will  turn  in  thither  to  see.  No  doubt  thereof,  said  Chris- 
tian, for  his  principles  lead  him  that  way,  and  a  hundred  to 
one  but  he  dies  there.  Then  Demas  called  again.  But  will 
you  not  come  over  and  see  ?  Then  Christian  finished  the 
matter  with  great  decision  for  himself  and  Hopeful,  and 
roundly  answered,  saying,  Demas,  thou  art  an  enemy  to  the 
right  ways  of  the  Lord  of  this  way,  and  hast  been  already 
condemned  for  thine  own  turning  aside,  by  one  of  his  Ma- 
jesty's Judges  ;  and  why  seekest  thou  to  bring  us  into  the 
like  condemnation  ?  Besides,  if  we  at  all  turn  aside,  our 
Lord  the  King  will  certainly  hear  thereof,  and  will  there 
put  us  to  shame,  where  we  would  stand  with  boldness  be- 
fore him.  Then  Demas  cried  again  that  he  was  also  one 
of  their  fraternity,  and  that  if  they  would  tarry  a  little,  he 
also  himself  would  walk  with  them.  He  still  held  to  his 
profession  of  the  Christian,  and,  mistaken  man,  perhaps  to 
the  hope.  Then  said  Christian,  What  is  thy  name  ?  is  it 
not  the  same  by  the  which  I  have  called  thee  ?  Yes,  said 
Demas,  my  name  is  Demas,  I  am  the  son  of  Abraham.  I 
know  you,  said  Christian  ;  Gehazi  was  your  great  grand- 
father, and  Judas  your  father,  and  you  have  trod  in  their 
steps ;  it  is  but  a  devilish  prank  that  thou  usest ;  thy  father 
was  hanged  for  a  traitor,  and  thou  deservest  no  better  re- 
ward. Assure  thyself  that  when  we  come  to  the  King,  we 
will  do  him  word  of  this  thy  behavior.  This  was  plain 
dealing,  but  Christian  was  always  plain,  and  he  thought 
the  case  deserved  severity,  as  it  surely  did.  And  so  they 
went  their  way. 

They  were  safe,  by  God's  grace,  from  this  temptation ; 


THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS.  87 

they  had  not  entered  into  it.  They  had  passed  through  all 
the  allurements  of  the  Plain  of  Ease ;  the  spirit  of  the 
temptations  there  had  not  entered  into  them;  and  when 
they  came  to  the  mines,  they  did  not  enter  into  temptation^ 
they  did  not  go  and  see.  They  were  kept  from  breaking 
the  hedge,  and  the  hedge  kept  them. 

But  now,  victorious  Pilgrims,  be  not  high-minded,  but 
fear.  It  remains  to  be  seen  whether,  if  you  forget  your  de- 
pendence on  the  Lord  Jesus,  and  his  commands,  though 
you  have  now  resisted  a  temptation  that  has  overcome  By- 
ends  and  his  companions,  you  will  not  yourselves  be  found 
entering  into,  and  overcome  by  a  smaller  temptation  even 
than  that  by  which  they  were  ruined.  Let  him  that  stand- 
eth,  take  heed  lest  he  fall. 


PART    II. 

GOING    TO    SEE,    AND    ENTERING    IN. 

By  this  time  By-ends  and  his  companions  were  come 
again  within  sight,  and  they  at  the  first  beck  went  over  to 
Demas.  Now  whether  they  fell  into  the  pit  by  looking 
over  the  brink  thereof,  or  whether  they  went  down  to  dig, 
or  whether  they  were  smothered  in  the  bottom  by  the  damps 
that  commonly  arise,  of  these  things  I  am  not  certain  ;  but 
this  I  observed,  that  they  never  were  seen  again  in  the  way. 
It  was  not  likely  that  they  would  be.  And  this  whole 
chapter  of  the  Pilgrimage  is  a  very  solemn  comment  on 
those  verses  in  Paul,  "  They  that  will  be  rich  fall  into  temp- 
tation, and  a  snare,  and  into  many  foolish  and  hurtful  lusts, 
which  drown  men  in  destruction  and  perdition.  For  the 
love  of  money  is  the  root  of  all  evil :  which  while  some 
coveted  after,  they  have  erred  from  the  faith,  and  pierced 
themselves  through  with  many  sorrows." 


88  THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS. 

They  that  luill  be  rich,  supremely  determined  upon  that, 
they  are  always  in  haste  to  be  rich  ;  and  God's  law  in  this 
world,  and  we  are  inclined  to  think  in  all  worlds,  is  just  this : 
nothing  truly  good  in  haste.  It  is  a  marvellous  off-shoot 
of  God's  great  plan  for  redeeming  our  world,  that  things 
are  so  constituted,  in  spite  of  all  the  art  and  power  of  Sa- 
tan, that  ordinarily  men  cannot  get  rich  in  a  moment.  If 
Satan  could  make  sudden  riches  the  rule  of  his  adminis- 
tration as  god  of  this  world,  if  our  great  God  and  Saviour 
permitted  that,  very  few  souls  would  ever  be  converted  and 
saved.  There  is  an  ingredient  in  sudden  riches,  of  a  search- 
ing, poisonous,  subtle  power,  that  very  few  constitutions  are 
proof  against. 

The  stress  is  laid  in  Scripture  on  the  thirst  for  wealth 
and  on  hasty  wealth.  He  that  maketh  haste  to  be  rich, 
God  says,  shall  not  be  innocent.  This  declaration,  by  him 
that  knoweth  our  hearts,  is  exceedingly  solemn ;  and  by 
how  many  affecting  and  solemn  instances  in  every  age  is  it 
sustained !  But  apart  from  direct  crime,  the  effect  of 
sudden  wealth  upon  the  character  is  disastrous.  Gener- 
ally men  become  rich  by  hard  labor  ;  it  may  not  be  by 
manual  labor,  though  it  may  have  been  begun  with  that, 
founded  in  that.  More  ordinarily,  it  is  the  work  of  all  the 
faculties,  both  of  mind  and  body.  It  is  energy  and  solidity 
in  some  estimable  qualities  inwrought  into  habit.  It  is 
attention  to  the  tides  of  affairs,  enterprise,  good  judgment, 
method,  accuracy,  careful  reckoning,  devotion  to  business 
and  not  to  pleasure,  knowledge  of  men,  the  wise  selection 
of  markets,  a  quick  sight  of  reality  and  discernment  of 
falsehood,  the  seizure  of  what  is  practicable  amidst  a  mass 
of  propositions  or  possibilities.  It  is  the  wise  adjustment  of 
plans,  and  energy  in  the  pursuit  of  them.  It  is  the  know- 
ing where  to  stop,  as  well  as  when  and  where  to  set  out. 
Immethodical  and  careless  men  cannot  be  wealthy ;  theatre- 
goers and  pleasure-seekers  cannot  be  wealthy.  Your  mer- 
chants will  not  even  have  ^  qley^  who  runs  after  the  plays, 


THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS.  89 

and  is  the  companion  of  actors  and  actresses.  Men  be- 
come rich  by  habits  of  self-restraint  and  industry.  And 
men  who  acquire  money  in  this  gradual  and  indefatigable 
way,  are  all  the  while  surrounded  by  influences  that  tend 
much  to  check  and  contradict  the  inordinate  passion  for 
wealth,  or  at  least  prevent  it  from  becoming  the  insane 
greed  of  the  miser.  They  have  innumerable  calls  upon 
their  generosity  and  charity ;  they  have  courtesies  to  exer- 
cise one  towards  another  ;  they  meet  with  losses  to  balance, 
and  hold  in,  the  passion  of  avarice.  They  have  the  cares  of 
their  families,  the  education  of  their  children,  the  calls  and 
duties  of  social  and  civil  life  all  pressing  upon  them  ;  and 
they  constantly  encounter  events  to  teach  them  their  depend- 
ence upon  God,  and  to  make  them  feel,  if  they  will  heed  the 
lesson,  the  danger  of  trusting  in  uncertain  riches.  All  this 
constitutes  a  discipline,  which  may  very  much  keep  down 
and  restrain,  though  it  cannot  cure,  the  ruling  evil  of  a 
man's  nature.  It  holds  his  passions  in  check,  and  gives 
opportunity  for  other  things  to  grow  besides  evil. 

On  the  other  hand,  riches  that  are  gotten  not  by  the 
exercise  of  superior  faculties,  not  by  patience,  energy, 
enterprise  and  industry,  but  by  gambling,  by  hazardous 
and  lucky  speculation,  by  sudden  windfalls,  or  by  hasty 
adventures  not  unmingled  with  fraud,  are  very  different  in 
their  effect  upon  the  character.  They  tend  to  uproot  all 
principle ;  they  throw  a  man  afloat,  instead  of  fastening 
him.  They  overset  or  intoxicate  the  mind,  not  satisfy  it. 
They  rather  kindle  the  passions,  instead  of  disciplining  or 
restraining  them.  Few  men  can  bear  a  sudden  accession 
of  great  prosperity  of  any  kind.  You  could  throw  a  five 
pound  weight  of  small  shot  at  a  man,  one  by  one,  with 
your  whole  force,  and  not  hurt  him,  though  you  should 
strike  him  in  the  head  with  every  one  of  them ;  but  hit 
him  with  a  single  piece  of  iron  of  the  same  weight,  and 
you  will  kill  him. 

Moreover  there  is   a  great  difference  between   seeking 


90 


THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS. 


wealth  in  the  long  run,  by  a  wise  interchange  of  the  great 
commodities  of  cities  and  nations,  by  buying  and  selling, 
by  manufacturing  and  trading,  and  the  thousand  appli- 
ances of  a  world-wide  commerce,  and  seeking  the  images 
and  representatives  of  wealth  directly,  the  yellow  gold 
itself.  The  other  may  be  an  undue  chronic  excitement, 
but  this  last  is  truly  tlie  yellow  fever.  There  is  as  great 
a  difference  ai^  Carlyle  makes  between  a  sincere  pagan 
idolatry,  that  ignorantly  worships  God  under  the  form  of 
idols,  and  an  insincere,  lying,  hypocritical  idolatry,  like 
that  which  the  idolatrous  Jews  took  up,  when  they  knew 
better,  worshipping  the  idols  themselves.  When  it  comes 
to  the  real  worship  of  idols,  instead  of  the  things  which 
the  idols  represent,  it  is  the  uttermost  depth  of  human 
degradation.  And  just  so  the  miserly  worship  of  yellow 
gold  is  the  basest  of  passions.  Place  a  man  in  a  position 
in  which,  by  a  few  years'  honest  and  dilligent  application 
of  his  faculties,  he  will  be  sure  of  a  fortune,  and  you  are, 
in  fact,  running  him  in  a  mould  of  character,  which  may  be 
very  favorable  to  goodness,  which  certainly  does  not  exclude 
it,  but  in  which,  availing  himself  of  the  grace  of  God,  he 
may  'make  almost  anything  of  himself  that  he  pleases. 
Place  a  man  at  the  mouth  of  a  gold  mine,  with  a  shovel 
and  pick-axe,  and  we  do  not  think  you  see  any  immediate 
discipline  of  goodness  or  prospect  of  virtue  there.  His 
frame  will  tremble  with  the  excitement  of  pure  avarice, 
and  as  he  digs,  digs,  digs,  the  yellow  dirt  itself,  if  he  be 
not  unnaturally  careful,  gets  the  fascination  of  a  snake 
over  him.  He  is  very  much  in  danger  either  of  becoming 
a  miser  or  a  spendthrift,  of  going  to  one  extreme  or  the 
other.  There  is  no  hunger  that  is  so  intense,  so  biting,  as 
that  after  gold  in  the  form  of  gold.  The  miser  would  eat 
and  drink  his  gold,  if  he  could.  A  sort  of  metallic  poison 
seems  to  get  into  his  veins,  into  his  heart.  There  is  great 
danger  in  this. 

But  all  this  danger  Christian  and  Hopeful  escaped,  and 


THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS.  91 

with  comparatively  great  ease.     They  were  very  decided. 
Then  said  Christian  to  Hopeful,  Let  us  not  stir  a  step,  but 
still  keep  on  our  way.     This  was  good  advice  and  determi- 
nation, and  it  needed  no  second  word  to  Hopeful  to  set  him 
right,  for  he  confided  greatly  in  the  knowledge  and  Christian 
experience  of  his  brother,  and  was  willing  to  be  guided  by 
him,  and  so  they  went  on  their  way.     So  they  were  past 
that  danger,  by  the  grace  of  God.     But  there  was  another 
before  them,  and  Christian  perhaps  began  already  to  be  a 
little  sensible  of  his  own  superiority  and  great  growth  in 
grace,  a  thing  which  generally  goes  before  a  fall.    Moreover 
Christians  are  not  always  the  same  ;  and  a  man  who  is 
strong  one  day  against  a  particular  temptation,  will  be  over- 
come, it  may  be,  another  day,  if  he  is  at  all  self-relying  or 
off  his  guard,  by  another,  even  though  the  last  be  weaker 
than  the  first.     It  was  but  a  little  space  after  this  in  their 
pilgrimage,  a  few  days  and  nights  of  delightful  travelling 
along  the  River  of  Life,  which   here  ran  sweetly  by  the 
wayside,  that  they  came  to  a  rough  place  of  road,  and  By- 
path Meadow  beside  it.     Now  who  would  have  thought 
that  this  same  Christian,  who  was  so  bold  and  determined 
against  the  mine,  especially  against  the  very  idea  of  turn- 
ing out  of  the  way  to  see  it,  and  who  had  almost  chided 
Hopeful,   as  Hopeful  did  himself,   for  having  entertained 
such  a  thought,  that  this  same  Christian,  on  a  much  less 
temptation  would  be  the  first  to  propose  going  out  of  the 
way  for  the  sake  of  ease,  and  the  one  to  advise  and  lead 
Hopeful  out  of  the  way.     They  had  both  come  safely  and 
faithfully  all  the  way  across  the  Plain  of  Ease,  and  past 
the  gold  region,  without  either  stopping  or  turning  aside. 
But  now  they  begin  to  be  troubled  at  the  weariness  of  the 
way,  and  Christian  looks  wishfully  over  into  the  meadow, 
and  without  entering  into  any  consultation  with  Hopeful 
as  to  the  lawfulness  of  his  thought,  suddenly  says  to  him, 
If  this  meadow  lieth  along  by  our  way-side,  let's  go  over 
into  it.     They  had  both  been  walking  along  in  silence,  per- 


92  ,  THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS. 

haps  with  the  same  thought,  but  we  do  not  think  Hopeful 
would  have  given  it  utterance,  if  Christian  had  not  begun. 
However,  Christian  waited  for  nothing,  but  went  to  the 
stile  to  see  ;  he  that  had  been  so  dead  set  against  turning 
out  of  the  way  even  to  look  at  the  mine  ;  and  behold  a  path 
lay  along  by  the  way  on  the  other  side  of  the  fence. 

'T  is  according  to  my  wish,  said  Christian,  here  is  the  easi- 
est going  ;  come,  good  Hopeful,  and  let  us  go  over.  Chris- 
tian has  forgotten,  now,  his  own  sermon  a  few  days  ago  on  the 
danger  and  sinfulness  of  turning  aside  to  see,  and  he  would 
now  go  straight  over.  And  now  it  is  Hopeful  that  puts  in  a 
warning.  But  how,  said  Hopeful,  if  this  path  should  lead 
us  out  of  the  way?  That's  not  likely,  said  Christian; 
look,  doth  it  not  go  along  by  the  way-side  ?  And  now,  as 
before  Hopeful  yielded  to  Christian's  warnings  not  to  go, 
he  now  yields  to  his  persuasions  to  go ;  the  example  and 
advice  of  the  older  and  more  experienced  Christian  has  as 
much  power  against  the  right  way,  as  it  had  before  for  it. 
So  Hopeful  being  persuaded  by  his  fellow,  went  after  him 
over  the  stile.  When  they  were  gone  over,  and  were  got 
into  the  path,  they  found  it  very  easy  to  their  feet ;  and 
w^ithal,  they,  looking  before  them,  espied  a  man  walking  as 
they  did,  and  his  name  was  Vain  Confidence  ;  so  they  called 
after  him,  and  asked  him  whither  that  way  led.  He  said 
to  the  Celestial  Gate.  Curious  !  to  see  how,  instantly,  as 
soon  as  the  Pilgrims  begin  to  turn  from  the  right  way, 
they  ask  about  it  of  those  who  are  walking  with  them  or 
before  them,  and  not  of  the  Lord  of  the  way.  And  then 
the  confidence  of  Vain  Confidence  !  To  the  Celestial  Gate, 
to  be  sure  ;  am  not  I  going  that  way  myself,  and  should  I 
be  wrong?  Look,  said  Christian  to  Hopeful,  did  not  I  tell 
you  so  ?  by  this  you  may  see  we  are  right.  So  the  echo 
of  a  man's  own  evil  or  questionable  word  or  thought  saith, 
Hear  what  a  multitude  of  voices ;  we  are  surely  right.  So 
they  followed,  and  he  went  before  them.  But  behold  the 
night  came  on,  and  it  grew  very  dark ;  so  that  they  that 


THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS.  -^  93 

were  behind  lost  the  sight  of  him  that  went  before.  O  how 
soon  it  grows  dark  when  we  leave  God's  word,  and  rrfn 
after  our  own  ease,  when  we  leave  God's  way  and  run  after 
our  own  way !  Dark  indeed!  It  is  a  dread  darkness  now 
settling  down  over  Christian  and  Hopeful.  And  you  see 
here  how  much  more  easily  a  man  may  be  t(^mpted  aside 
from  the  path  of  duty  by  the  suggestions  of  his  own  self- 
seeking  heart,  than  by  external  temptations  when  he  is 
somewhat  on  his  guard  against  them.  If  a  man  by  the 
way-side  should  invite  you  in  ever  so  gentlemanly  a  way 
to  do  a  thing  against  conscience,  you  would  repel  the  temp- 
tiEition,  knowing  that  he  as  well  as  yourself  is  aware  of  the 
evil.  But  go  a  little  farther,  and  let  self  or  the  love  of  ease 
present  some  out-of-the-way  gratification,  and  you  will  per- 
haps not  only  go  yourself  to  the  stile  to  see,  but  at  once 
you  will  climb  over  and  perhaps  persuade  others  to  do  like- 
wise. The  temptations  which  Satan  presents  in  our  own 
hearts  are  sometimes  more  dangerous  than  all  others. 

You  may  see  how  the  heart  deceives  itself,  by  just  turn- 
ing back  to  the  brave  conversation  of  these  Christians  in 
the  joy  of  their  victory  over  their  former  temptation  and 
their  escape  from  that  danger,  and  comparing  it  with  their 
conduct  now  in  getting  over  the  stile.  Just  after  they 
had  come  safe  off  from  Demas  and  the  mines,  they  passed 
a  strange  fearful-looking  old  monument,  which  they  at 
length  discovered  to  be  the  pillar  of  salt  into  which  Lot's 
wife  was  changed,  because  she  looked  back  with  a  covetous 
heart  when  the  angels  were  fleeing  with  her  from  Sodom. 
Ah,  my  brother,  said  Christian,  this  is  a  seasonable  sight 
after  the  invitation  of  Demas  to  come  over  and  view  the 
Hill  Lucre  ;  and  had  we  gone  over,  as  he  desired  us,  and 
as  thou  my  brother  wast  inclining  to  do,  we  had,  for  aught 
I  know,  been  made  ourselves  a  spectacle  for  those  that  shall 
come  after  to  behold.  Hopeful's  ingenuous  confession  is 
beautiful.  I  am  sorry,  said  he,  that  I  was  so  foolish,  and  am 
made  to  wonder   that  I  am  not  now  as  Lot's  wife:   for 


94  ^^  THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS. 

wherein  was  the  difference  betwixt  her  sin  and  mine  ?  She 
only  looked  back,  and  I  had  a  desire  to  go  see.  Let  grace 
be  adored,  and  let  me  be  ashamed  that  ever  such  a  thing 
should  be  in  my  heart.  Then  said  Christian,  let  us  take 
notice  of  what  we  see  here,  for  our  help  for  time  to  come. 
This  woman  escaped  one  judgment,  for  she  fell  not  by  the 
destruction  of  Sodom ;  yet  she  was  destroyed  by  another, 
as  we  see  she  is  turned  into  a  pillar  of  salt.  True,  said 
Hopeful,  and  she  may  be  to  us  both  caution  and  example ; 
caution  that  we  should  shun  her  sin,  or  a  sign  of  what 
judgment  will  overtake  such  as  shall  not  be  prevented  by 
this  caution.  But  above  all  I  muse  at  one  thing,  to  wit, 
how  Demas  and  his  fellows  can  stand  so  confidently  yon- 
der to  look  for  that  treasure,  which  this  woman  for  looking 
behind  her  after  (for  we  read  not  that  she  stept  one  foot  out 
of  the  way)  was  turned  into  a  pillar  of  salt ;  specially  since 
the  judgment  that  overtook  her,  did  make  her  an  example 
within  sight  of  where  they  are  ;  for  they  cannot  choose  but 
see  her,  did  they  but  lift  up  their  eyes. 

It  is  a  thing  to  be*  wondered  at,  said  Christian,  and  it 
argueth  that  their  heart  is  grown  desperate  in  that  case. 
And  it  is  most  rationally  to  be  concluded  that  such  as  sin 
in  the  sight,  yea  and  in  despite  of  such  examples  as  are  set 
continually  before  them  to  caution  them  to  the  contrary, 
must  be  partakers  of  severest  judgments. — Doubtless,  said 
Hopeful,  thou  hast  spoken  the  truth  ;  but  what  a  mercy  is 
it  that  neither  thou,  but  especially  I,  am  not  made  myself 
this  example  !  This  ministereth  occasion  to  us  to  thank 
God,  to  fear  before  him,  and  always  to  remember  Lot's 
wife. 

Yes  !  but  how  soon  they  themselves  forget  all  this  !  And 
what  a  picture  is  this  of  the  heart's  unsuspected  deceitful- 
ness  and  power  of  self-delusion.  A  few  days  afterwards, 
under  the  power  of  temptation,  they  themselves  forgot  all 
this ;  Christian,  the  experienced  man,  led  the  way  over  the 
stile,  and  they  entered  into  Giant  Despair's  Castle.     "  Ex- 


THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS.  .-A.  95 

perience,  like  the  stern  lights  of  a  ship,  only  serves  to  illu- 
mine the  path  that  has  been  passed  over." 

My  brethren,  says  James,  count  it  all  joy,  vrhen  ye  fall 
into  divers  temptations  !  A  singular  congratulation  truly  ! 
It  would  have  come  like  vinegar  upon  nitre  to  poor  Chris- 
tian and  Hopeful,  that  terrible  night  of  their  distress  amidst 
storm  and  darkness.  And  yet,  it  had  been  all  joy  if  they 
had  passed  that  stile  of  temptation  without  going  over  it, 
according  to  their  "  brave"  conversation  about  Lot's  wife. 
James  does  not  say.  Count  it  all  joy  when  ye  eMer  into 
temptation.  Entering  into  temptations  is  a  very  different 
thing  from  falling  into  them  by  the  providence  of  God  for 
faith's  trial.  Blessed  is  the  man  that  endureth  tempta- 
tion, says  James,  and  the  endurance  is  supposed  in  the  first 
text,  where  we  are  to  count  the  meeting  of  temptations  all 
joy.  Be  it  that  in  that  case  the  temptations  mainly  mean 
trials,  and  not  allurements  to  sin ;  yet  even  temptations  to 
wander  from  God  are  blessings,  if  resisted,  for  they  issue 
in  greater  grace  and  firmness.  But  the  entering  into  temp- 
tation is  a  very  different  thing,  as  different  as  Christian's 
going  to  the  stile  and  getting  over  was  different  from  De- 
mas'  calling  to  him  out  of  the  way,  and  being  refused. 

The  endurance  of  temptation  is  good  for  two  things,  for 
the  discovery  of  the  wickedness  there  is  in  ourselves,  and 
the  grace  there  is  in  our  Saviour.  We  do  not  know  how 
to  value  Christ  aright,  till  we  find  how  sinful  we  are  our- 
selves ;  and  we  do  not  learn  to  rest  upon  Christ's  strength, 
till  we  find  we  have  none  of  our  own  but  weakness.  If  we 
did  not  see  and  feel  our  own  sinfulness  and  wretchedness, 
we  should  not  feel  his  preciousness  at  all ;  and  so,  if  God 
kept  us  from  all  circumstances  and  conjunctions,  which 
would  bring  out  our  sins,  and  disclose  the  hidden  evils  of 
our  hearts,  we  might  go  on  with  a  fair  form  of  piety,  and 
without  falling  into  any  particular  snares,  be  all  the  while 
going  further  and  further  from  Christ,  and  becoming  more 
and  more  ignorant  both  of  him  and  of  ourselves. 


96  ^(^^  THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS. 

w 

"  Watch  and  pray,  that  ye  enter  not  into  temptation." 
"  Lead  us  not  into  temptation."  The  prayer  is  not,  Let  us 
not  be  tempted,  suffer  us  not  to  endure  temptations  ;  but. 
Let  us  not  enter  into  temptation.  There  is  something 
very  emphatic  in  those  words  enter  into.  A  man  may  be 
exposed  to  temptation,  and  by  the  grace  of  God  come  off 
victorious,  and  be  the  stronger  for  the  temptation,  if  he 
resists  it  promptly,  if  he  flies  trembling  to  Christ.  But  if 
he  dallies  with  it,  if  he  dwells  upon  its  circumstances,  if  he 
is  not  watching  and  praying,  if  he  undertakes  to  see  how 
far  he  may  go  in  it  without  falling,  if  he  but  half  rejects 
it,  and  half  entertains  it,  then  he  is  entering'  into  tempta 
tion,  then  he  is  in  fearful  danger.  He  is  entering  into  it  as 
in  a  cloud,  surrounded  by  which  he  ceases  to  behold  eternal 
realities,  or  sees  them  so  dimly,  as  not  to  feel  their  force. 
And  the  deeper  he  enters  into  it,  the  farther  he  is  from 
God.  It  is  a  stupefying  as  well  as  a  darkening  cloud,  an 
atmosphere  that  paralyzes  the  spiritual  energies.  Let  a 
man  once  enter  into  temptation,  and  Satan  has  great 
power  over  him.  Let  a  man  play  the  part  of  Parley  the 
Porter,  and  the  foes  of  his  soul  are  soon  within  the  citadel. 
It  is  a  Latin  maxim  of  great  wisdom  in  regard  to  evil 
habits,  Obsta  principiis — resist  the  beginnings  ;  and  this 
is  of  infinite  importance  in  regard  to  temptation.  Resist  it 
wholly  at  once,  take  not  a  step  upon  its  borders,  enter  not 
into  it  at  all,  but  turn  from  it  with  supreme  decision.  Go 
not  up  to  the  stile  to  look  over,  and  see  how  inviting  the 
enclosure,  for  when  you  do  this  you  are  entering  into  temp- 
tation, your  next  step  will  probably  be  over  the  stile,  and 
there,  while  you  think  you  are  keeping  in  sight  of  the 
King's  highway,  and  can  return  to  it  in  a  moment,  you 
may  wander  from  it  fatally,  and,  almost  before  you  are 
aware,  find  yourself  fast  locked  in  Giant  Despair's  Castle. 
The  temptation  to  neglect  prayer  is  one  of  those  tempta- 
tions in  the  Christian  life,  which,  if  a  man  gives  way  to  it, 
opens  the  door  to  all  other  temptations.     So  our  blessed 


THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS.  ^V^       ^ 

Lord  says  watch  and  pray,  and  watch  unto  prayer,  for 
while  that  is  done,  the  door  of  other  temptations  is  shut, 
the  soul  neither  enters  into  them,  nor  they  into  the  soul. 
But  if  prayer  be  neglected,  the  soul  is  in  an  exposed  con- 
dition, ready  to  be  overcome  even  by  slight  temptations. 

In  that  very  beautiful  and  instructive  allegory  by  Han- 
nah Moore,  entitled  Parley  the  Porter,  there  is  mention 
made  of  a  pleasant  garden  surrounding  the  Castle,  which 
had  been  committed  by  the  Lord  to  his  servants  to  keep, 
and  a  thick  hedge  separating  this  garden  from  the  wilder- 
ness, which  was  infested  by  robbers.  The  master  of  the 
Castle  charged  his  servants  in  his  absence  always  to  keep 
within  these  limits  ;  and  he  told  them  that  they  would 
consult  their  own  safety  and  happiness,  as  well  as  show 
their  love  to  him,  by  not  even  venturing  over  to  the  extrem- 
ity of  their  bounds  ;  for  that  he  who  goes  as  far  as  he 
dares,  always  shows  a  wish  to  go  farther  than  he  ought, 
and  commonly  does  so.  So  it  was  found  that  the  nearer 
these  servants  kept  to  the  castle,  and  the  farther  from  the 
hedge^  the  more  ugly  the  wilderness  appeared.  But  the 
nearer  they  approached  the  forbidden  bounds,  their  own 
home  appeared  more  dull,  and  the  wilderness  more  delight- 
ful. And  this  the  master  knew  when  he  gave  his  orders, 
for  he  never  did  or  said  anything  without  a  good  reason. 
And  when  his  servants  sometimes  desired  an  explanation 
of  the  reason,  he  used  to  tell  them  they  would  understand 
it  when  they  came  to  the  other  house  :  for  it  was  one  of 
the  pleasures  of  that  house,  that  it  would  explain  aU  the 
mysteries  of  this,  and  any  little  obscurities  in  the  master's 
conduct  would  then  be  made  quite  plain. 

Thus  it  is,  that  the  nearer  we  keep  to  God,  and  the 
farther  from  sin  and  temptation,  the  more  delightful  is  the 
life  of  holiness  and  the  more  hateful  does  sin  appear.  But 
when  we  venture  near  the  hedge,  and  endeavor  at  first  to 
peep  over  it,  and  then  begin  to  open  it,  taking  off  at  first 
a  handful  of  leaves,  then  a  little  sprig,  then  a  bough  or  two, 

5 


98         ^tr  THE    TWO    TEMPTATIONS. 

we  are  entering  into  temptation,  and  holiness  seems  diffi- 
cult, and  sin  more  and  more  tempting.  Every  glance  that 
is  taken  through  the  broken  hedge  makes  the  thoughts  of 
the  master's  castle  more  irksome,  and  increases  the  desire 
to  get  out  into  the  wilderness.  The  only  way  to  deal 
safely  with  temptations  is  not  to  enter  into  them,  but  to 
keep  them  as  much  as  possible  at  a  distance,  and  to  keep 
as  far  as  possible  even  from  the  hedge.  Temptations  to 
sin  are  very  different  from  trials  and  afflictions  for  the 
removal  of  sin.  We  ought  not  to  be  too  much  afraid  of 
these  last,  but  we  cannot  well  be  too  much  afraid  of  the 
first. 


THE  LAKE  AMONG  THE  MOUNTAINS. 

A   CHILD'S    LETTER  AND   LESSON. 


There  was  once  a  little  stream  among  the  mountains,  so 
small  that  it  was  lost  in  the  first  sand-bed  across  which  it 
attempted  to  make  its  way.  But  God  designed  to  make 
of  this  rill  a  great,  wide,  beautiful  lake,  that  might,  if  need 
be,  remain  to  all  time,  majestic  and  glorious.  Whereupon 
he  hedged  the  rill  about  with  high  restraints,  and  threw 
across  it  an  impenetrable  barrier  of  mountains.  Thus  dis- 
ciplined, it  grew  upon  itself,  and  rose  and  expanded,  till  in 
process  of  time  it  did  indeed  become  a  deep,  majestic  water, 
into  which  the  cliffs  looked  down  with  wonder,  to  see  them- 
selves and  the  heavens  so  perfectly  reflected,  crystal  clear. 

But  now  the  lake  grew  proud,  and  said  within  itself  and 
to  itself,  I  am  too  much  shut  up  and  confined.  The  restraint 
upon  me  is  unworthy  of  so  great  a  body,  unworthy  of  a  free 
state.  I  ought  to  have  scope  to  exercise  my  sovereign  will, 
and  be  governed  by  it.  Besides,  why  shut  myself  up  in 
this  basin,  when  I  am  worthy  to  spread  all  over  the  world  ? 
So  grand  a  creature  as  I  am  ought  not  to  be  restricted 
within  such  narrow  limits,  but  to  go  roaming,  and  admired 
in  every  continent.     I  will  be  free. 

Now,  the  silly  lake  did  not  consider  for  a  moment,  did 
not  even  once  think,  that  that  very  imprisonment  was  the 
cause  of  all  its  greatness  and  all  its  beauty  ;  and  all  its 
usefulness  too,  so  that  ten  thousand  Croton  aqueducts 
might  have  been  carried  from  it,  if  need  be,  to  ten  thousand 
cities  ;  and,  indeed,  a  beautiful  river  ran  from  it  continu- 
ally.   Moreover,  it  forgot  its  origin,  so  weak  and  low,  forgot 


100  THE  LAKE  AMONG  THE  MOUNTAINS. 

the  time  when  it  was  like  an  infant  in  the  cradle,  and  would 
have  been  lost  in  getting  across  the  first  sand-bank.  It  had 
grown  up,  only  because  God  had  restrained  it,  and  now  it 
had  got  so  large,  that  it  threw  off  all  humility,  all  thoughts 
of  subjection,  and  became  boisterous  and  proud. 

But  pride  goeth  before  destruction,  and  a  haughty  spirit 
before  a  fall,  as  we  shall  see.  The  lake  brooded  upon  these 
wicked  thoughts,  till  at  length  it  lost  all  patience  and  self- 
control,  and  began  to  beat  madl}^  against  the  mountain 
ramparts,  that  hemmed  it  in,  and  preserved  it  in  power 
and  beauty.  For  some  time  its  efforts  were  all  ineffectual ; 
the  mountains  remained  steady  at  their  post,  and  the  over- 
hanging cliffs  looked  down  in  amazement  to  see  the  calm 
and  beautiful  lake  so  ruffled  and  distorted,  lashing  itself 
into  such  vain  fury.  But  when  there  is  an  evil  will,  there 
is  always  an  evil  way.  A  desire  after  sin  within  us,  always 
finds  tempting  occasions  without  us. 

There  were  certain  persons  envious  of  the  great,  beauti- 
ful lake,  because  it  was  not  in  the  dominions  of  their  own 
State  ;  and  at  the  same  time  that  these  evil  passions  and 
causes  of  ruin  were  working  within,  they  laid  a  plan  to  de- 
stroy all  its  greatness,  from  without.  They  began  to  un- 
dermine the  mountain  barrier,  and  succeeded  in  producing 
a  great  avalanche  from  without,  so  that  the  swelling  and 
pressing  of  the  lake  from  within  began  to  produce  some 
impression.  At  length,  one  dark  night,  when  a  dreadful 
storm  was  raging,  the  lake  burst  impetuously  through,  and 
thundered  down  into  the  valley,  carrying  terrific  devasta- 
tion in  its  course.  The  next  morning  there  was  nothing 
to  be  seen  of  it  but  a  bed  of  sand  where  it  formerly  rested, 
and  a  long  pathway  of  ruins — rocks,  sand  and  gravel-— 
where  it  rushed  away.  It  had  gained  its  freedom,  but  it 
had  destroyed  itself ;  it  had  burst  through  all  restraint,  but 
in  doing  so,  it  had  sacrificed  the  causes  of  its  beauty,  its 
grandeur,  its  life.     It  was  all  gone  and  perished. 

Now,  my  dear  little  children,  and  you  ye  large  children 


THE    LAKE    AMONG    THE    MOUNTAINS.  101 

with  straps  to  yoar  pantaloons,  listen  to  the  moral  of  my 
story.  It  has  two  applications  :  the  first,  to  every  one  of 
us  as  individuals ;  and  the  second,  to  our  country.  Let  no 
man  think  that  true  freedom  consists  in  deliverance  from 
all  restraiiit^_JLetjBYery-nian--tliink,  that  in  xrrder  to  be 
good  and  great,  he  must  be  restrained  and  hemmed  in  on 
every  side.  The  providence  and  the  word  of  God  must 
encircle  and  confine  him.  If  he  wishes  to  do  great  good  to 
the  world,  let  him  be  assured  that  the  lake  of  his  good  in- 
tentions must  be  confined  by  the  word  of  God,  and  that  if 
he  bursts  this  barrier,  the  cataract  of  his  benevolence  will 
only  cover  the  earth  ten  feet  deep  with  mud  and  ruin,  and 
in  the  end  will  come  to  nothing. 

If  he  wishes  to  be  very  large  and  free,  let  him  remem- 
ber that  it  is  nothing  but  the  truth  can  make  him  free,  and 
that  it  was  a  great  king  who  said,  "I  will  run  in  the  way 
of  thy  commandments,  when  thou  shalt  enlarge  my  heart." 
A  large  heart  keeps  confined  within  God's  commandments, 
and  that  is  the  only  way  in  which  it  can  be  made  and  kept 
large ;  and  then  a  perennial  stream  of  goodness  runs  from 
it.  If  he  chafes  at  the  barrier,  let  him  remember  that 
without  it  he  would  be  lost  in  the  first  sand -bank.  If  he 
is  disposed  to  be  proud  of  his  greatness,  let  him  remember 
that  it  is  only  God  who  has  built  him  up  and  can  keep  him. 
And,  at  all  hazards,  let  him  keep  within  the  word  of  God. 

I  have  elsewhere  said  that  the  human  mind  is  like  a 
boy's  kite,  needing  to  be  confined  if  it  would  steadily  soar. 
So  the  human  reason  must  be  tied  to  the  word  of  God,  or 
it  cannot  fly.  My  dear  little  child,  did  you  ever  see  the 
boys  playing  with  a  kite  ?  Many  of  the  large  children, 
to  whom  I  am  speaking,  have  played  with  kites  themselves, 
when  they  were  not  much  larger  than  you  are,  when  they 
were  no  bigger  than  the  rill  that  grew  into  a  lake.  Did 
you  ever  see  a  little  boy's  paper  kite  in  the  air  when 
the  string  broke — how  it  began  to  waver,  and  go  sidelong, 
and  then  plunged  head  foremost  to  the  ground  ?    Just  so  it 


102  THE    LAKE    AMONG    THE    MOUNTAINS. 

is  with  the  human  reason,  when  it  casts  loose  from  God's 
word.  Down  it  comes  to  the  ground,  just  like  a  broken 
balloon,  and  woe  to  him  that  trusted  in  it.  He  thought  he 
was  going  up  to  the  third  heavens,  but  ten  to  one  it  will 
land  him  in  some  wild  marsh,  where  he  will  never  find  his 
way  out,  or  a  thousand  miles  at  sea,  where  he  will  struggle 
on  and  be  drowned.  I  know  many  men,  who  have  gone  up 
in  the  balloon,  and  come  down  in  the  mud. 

The  second  application  of  the  bursting  of  the  lake  is  to 
our  country  ;  and  you,  my  dear  little  child,  young  as  you 
are,  are  enough  of  a  politician  to  know  that  our  country 
cannot  be  great  and  happy  unless  in  obedience  to  God's 
word.  They  that  are  our  enemies,  would  undermine  our 
freedom  and  happiness  by  destroying  the  Sabbath,  and 
casting  off  the  authority  of  God's  word,  so  that  they  may 
make  a  breach  in  the  great  barrier  of  divine  truth  that 
protects  our  institutions.  And  if  they  should  succeed  in 
doing  this,  then  it  would  be  very  easy  for  wicked  dema- 
gogues and  infidels  to  raise  such  an  internal  proud  storm, 
that  the  mountains  would  give  way,  and  our  great  and  beau- 
tiful lake  of  liberty  and  happiness  would  go  to  destruction. 

When  we  were  a  little  rill,  and  God  threw  such  kind 
restraints  around  us,  to  make  us  a  broad,  deep  lake,  then 
we  were  keepers  at  home,  and  waited  on  Providence.  But 
now  we  begin  to  think  the  Divine  Providence  and  word 
too  narrow  and  strait  to  confine  our  mighty  genius,  and 
some  talk  as  if  we  had  a  mission,  having  begun  with  Mex- 
ico, to  extend  the  area  of  freedom  all  round  the  world, 
taking  Cuba  first  by  the  way.  But  our  mission  is,  simply, 
to  do  justly,  to  love  mercy,  and  to  walk  humbly  with  our 
God,  and  we  had  better  see  to  it  that  all  our  people  at 
home,  black  and  white,  enjoy  real  liberty,  before  we  under- 
take to  extend  the  area  of  freedom. 

But  I  find  my  letter  is  getting  long ;  and  having  per- 
formed my  promise,  and  more,  by  giving  you  both  a  story 
and  a  sermon,  I  shall  bid  you  good-bye. 


THE   WISDOM  OF  ANIMALS, 


A  FABLE    AFTER  THE  MANNER  OF  JESOP. 


There  was  once  upon  a  time  a  great  union  proposed  of 
all  the  beasts  against  their  enemies.  The  Lion  and  the 
Tiger,  the  Elephant  and  the  Rhinoceros,  the  Camel,  the 
Dromedary  and  the  Hippopotamus,  the  Horse  and  the  Ox, 
the  Cat,  the  Fox,  the  Wolf,  the  Sheep,  the  Dog,  all  came 
in  convention  to  discuss  the  matter.  They  agreed  to  lay 
aside  their  antagonistic  propensities  against  one  another,  to 
respect  each  other's  rights,  to  live  in  peace  among  them- 
selves, and  to  unite  in  a  common  defence  of  the  animal 
republic.  Things  were  in  this  happy  state,  when  a  Hyena 
got  up  in  the  assembly,  and  stated  that  the  race  of  Hyenas 
was  made  before  any  other  beasts  had  an  existence,  and 
that  the  lordship  over  all  the  beasts  was  so  committed  to 
that  race,  that  no  beast  could  be  considered  as  belonging 
to  the  animal  republic,  except  under  that  lordship.  This 
was  a  very  bold  and  arrogant  speech,  but  the  Hyena  stated 
that  all  antiquity  was  in  his  favor. 

It  were  vain  to  attempt  to  describe  the  angry  discussion 
to  which  these  pretensions  on  the  part  of  the  Hyena  gave 
rise.  It  is  sufficient  to  say  that  they  were  put  down  and 
utterly  rejected  in  the  assembly,  many  of  the  beasts  having 
shown  with  great  clearness  the  dreadful  wars  and  persecu- 
tions to  which  these  pretensions  had  given  rise  in  past 
times,  others  having  demonstrated  the  iniquity  of  such 
pretensions  on  the  part  of  any  beast  whatever,  and  others 


104  THE  WISDOM  OF  ANIMALS. 

having  proved  that  the  Hyena  had  heen,  with  these  preten- 
sions, as  far  as  he  could  be,  an  all-devouring  tyrant,  and 
that  it  was  necessary  to  guard  against  him  for  the  future. 
They  compelled  the  Hyena  to  the  alternative  of  either 
withdrawing  from  the  union,  or  withdrawing  his  own  pre- 
tensions to  the  government,  and  so,  rather  than  be  regarded 
as  a  universal  enemy,  he  chose  to  swallow  his  griefs  in 
silence. 

It  happened  on  a  time  after  this  that  a  history  of  the 
beasts  was  published,  which  contained,  among  other  things, 
a  clause  as  to  their  original  and  universal  equality.  A 
convention  of  the  beasts  was  held,  in  which,  among  other 
business,  they  determined  to  give  this  book  their  approba- 
tion, and  to  have  it  circulated  as  extensively  as  possible. 
In  this  convention  the  Hyena  got  up  and  stated  that  he 
had  great  objections  to  the  book  _as  it  was,  for  it  went 
against  what  his  particular  race  considered  as  their  right, 
and  would  be  regarded  by  all  the  Hyenas  as  a  sectarian 
book,  and  contrary  to  the  rules  of  their  union.  Strange  as 
it  may  seem,  for  the  sake  of  peace,  some  of  the  beasts 
were  for  altering  the  book  according  to  the  suggestions  of 
the  Hyena,  not  seeing  the  whole  tendency  of  the  move- 
ment. And  though  the  author  of  the  book  was  a  wise  old 
Lion,  who  had  his  den  among  the  mountains,  where  they 
might  have  sent  to  consult  him  on  such  an  important  point, 
they  were  for  cutting  oat  some  of  his  dearest  opinions, 
without  consulting  him  at  all. 

In  this  predicament  a  sagacious  Elephant  arose  and 
said  to  the  assembly,  "It  seems  to  me  very  surprising 
that  the  proposition  of  our  brother  Hyena  should  be  enter- 
tained for  a  moment.  It  seems  strange  to  me  that  any 
members  of  this  convention  do  not  see  at  once  that  even 
to  receive  it  is  to  receive  an  insult  to  us  all,  and  to  adopt  it 
would  be  just  cutting  off  our  own  heads.  For  when  our 
union  was  first  entered  into,  it  was  on  the  ground  of  uni- 
versal equality,  and  our  brother  Hyena  was  admitted  into 


THE  WISDOM  OF  ANIMALS.  105 

it  only  with  the  understanding  that  his  inordinate  and 
absurd  pretensions,  which  you  all  remember,  were  to  be 
withdrawn  out  of  it.  Now  do  you  not  see,  that  in  propos- 
ing to  have  this  clause  as  to  our  equality  stricken  out  of 
this  book  of  history,  he  does  it  not  out  of  the  desire  of 
peace  and  union,  but  out  of  an  ambition  to  rule  ?  Do  you 
not  see  that  in  claiming  to  have  this  stricken  out,  he  de- 
mands from  us  a  palpable  and  plain  confession  that  we 
are  inferior  to  him?  I  should  be  ashamed  of  any  beast 
who  would  be  ready  to  make  such  a  confession,  and  to 
make  it  for  the  pretended  sake  of  union  would  be  just  to 
introduce  war  and  prevent  all  possibility  of  union.  Let 
the  Hyena  and  all  his  race  dwell  apart,  if  they  choose,  and 
crack  bones  in  the  desert,  but  let  them  not  dare  to  come 
here  and  tell  us  that  in  publishing  the  declaration  of  our 
equality  in  dignity  and  rights,  we  are  publishing  sectarian 
matter,  and  matter  offensive  to  him  and  his  fellow  Hyenas. 
They  would  be  glad  indeed,  if  they  could,  to  have  all  our 
standards  abolished,  and  so  be  able  to  steal  in  with  their 
pretensions,  till  by  and  by  they  will  assert  them  as  an 
established  law.  For  my  part,  I  would  rather  lose  my 
trunk,  than  vote  to  pass  the  resolution  of  the  Hyena,  or 
even  admit  it  under  consideration.  On  the  contrary,  I 
move  that  he  be  called  to  order,  and  censured  for  introduc- 
ing it." 

The  speech  of  the  Elephant,  during  which  his  large  ears 
waved  like  the  gray  locks  of  an  old  Nestor,  carried  the 
whole  assembly.  They  cast  out  the  proposition  of  the 
Hyena,  and  resolved  to  print  the  book  as  it  was,  and  so 
the  ambitious  beast  concluded  once  more  to  swallow  his 
griefs  and  his  pretensions,  and  to  wait  for  another  oppor- 
tunity. 

Here  is  wisdom.     The  number  of  the  Beast  is 

SIX  HUNDRED  SIXTY-SIX, 
and  his  name  is — PRELACY. 

5* 


DEACON    GILES'    DISTILLERY 

» INQUIRE   AT  AMOS    GILES'   DISTILLERY." 


Some  time  ago  the  writer's  notice  was  arrested  by  an 
advertisement  in  one  of  the  newspapers,  which  closed  with 
words  similar  to  the  following  :  "  Inquire  at  Amos  Giles' 
Distillery."  The  reader  may  suppose,  if  he  choose,  that 
the  following  story  was  a  dream,  suggested  by  that  phrase. 

Deacon  Giles  was  a  man  who  loved  money,  and  was 
never  troubled  with  tenderness  of  conscience.  His  father 
and  his  grandfather  before  him  had  been  distillers,  and  the 
same  occupation  had  come  to  him  as  an  heirloom  in  the 
family.  The  still-house  was  black  with  age,  as  well  as 
with  the  smoke  of  furnaces  that  never  went  out,  and  the 
fumes  of  tortured  ingredients,  ceaselessly  converted  into 
alcohol.  It  looked  like  one  of  Vulcan's  Stithies,  trans- 
lated from  the  infernal  regions  into  this  world.  Its  stench 
filled  the  atmosphere,  and  it  seemed  as  if  drops  of  poisonous 
alcoholic  perspiration  might  be  made  to  ooze  out  from  any 
one  of  its  timbers  or  clapboards  on  a  slight  pressure.  Its 
owner  was  a  treasurer  to  a  Bible  Society ;  and  he  had  a 
little  counting-room  in  one  corner  of  the  distillery  where  he 
sold  Bibles. 

He  that  is  greedy  of  gain  troubleth  his  own  house. 
Any  one  of  those  Bibles  would  have  told  him  this,  but  he 
chose  to  learn  it  from  experience.  It  was  said  that  the 
"Worm  of  the  Still  lay  coiled  in  the  bosom  of  his  family, 
and  certain  it  is  that  one  of  its  members  had  drowned  him- 


DEACON    GILES*    DISTILLERY.  101^ 

self  in  the  vat  of  hot  liquor,  in  the  bottom  of  which  a  skel- 
eton was  some  time  after  found,  with  heavy  weights  tied  to 
the  ancle  bones.  Moreover,  Deacon  Giles'  temper  was  none 
of  the  sweetest,  naturally :  and  the  liquor  he  drank,  and- 
the  fires  and  spirituous  fumes  among  which  he  lived,  did 
nothing  to  soften  it.  If  his  workmen  sometimes  fell  into 
his  vats,  he  himself  oftener  fell  out  with  his  workmen. 
This  was  not  to  be  wondered  at,  considering  the  nature  of 
their  wages,  which,  according  to  no  unfrequent  stipulation, 
would  be  as  much  raw  rum  as  they  could  drink. 

Deacon  Giles  worked  on  the  Sabbath.  He  would  neither 
suffer  the  fires  of  the  distillery  to  go  out,  nor  to  burn  while 
he  was  idle ;  so  he  kept  as  busy  as  they.  One  Saturday 
afternoon  his  workmen  had  quarrelled,  and  all  went  off  in 
anger.  He  was  in  much  perplexity  for  want  of  hands  to  do 
the  work  of  the  devil  on  the  Lord's  day.  In  the  dusk  of 
the  evening  a  gang  of  singular-looking  fellows  entered  the 
door  of  the  distillery.  Their  dress  was  wild  and  uncouth, 
their  eyes  glared,  and  their  language  had  a  lone  that  was 
awful.  They  offered  to  work  for  the  Deacon ;  and  he,  on 
his  part,  was  overjoyed ;  for  he  thought  within  himself  that 
as  they  had  probably  been  turned  out  of  employment  else- 
where, he  could  engage  them  on  his  own  terms. 

He  made  them  his  accustomed  offer  ;  as  much  rum  every 
day,  when  work  was  done,  as  they  could  drink ;  but  they 
would  not  take  it.  Some  of  them  broke  out  and  told  him 
that  they  had  enough  of  hot  things  where  they  came  from, 
without  drinking  damnation  in  the  distillery.  And  when 
they  said  that,  it  seemed  to  the  Deacon  as  if  their  breath 
burned  blue ;  but  he  was  not  certain,  and  could  not  tell 
what  to  make  of  it.  Then  he  offered  them  a  pittance  of 
money ;  but  they  set  up  such  a  laugh,  that  he  thought  the 
roof  of  the  building  would  fall  in.  They  demanded  a  sum 
which  the  Deacon  said  he  could  not  give,  and  would  not, 
to  the  best  set  of  workmen  that  ever  lived,  much  less  to 
such  piratical  looking  scape-jails  as  they.     Finally,  he  said, 


108  DEACON    GILES'    DISTILLERY. 

he  would  give  half  what  they  asked,  if  they  would  take  two- 
thirds  of  that  in  Bibles.  "When  he  mentioned  the  word 
Bibles,  they  all  looked  towards  the  door,  and  made  a  step 
backwards,  and  the  Deacon  thought  they  trembled;  but 
whether  it  was  with  anger  or  delirium  tremens  or  some- 
thing else,  he  could  not  tell.  However,  they  winked,  and 
made  signs  to  each  other,  and  then  one  of  them,  who  seemed 
to  be  the  head  man,  agreed  with  the  Deacon,  that  if  he 
would  let  them  work  by  night  instead  of  day,  they  would 
stay  with  him  awhile,  and  work  on  his  own  terms.  To 
this  he  agi-eed,  and  they  immediately  went  to  work. 

The  Deacon  had  a  fresh  cargo  of  molasses  to  be  worked 
up,  and  a  great  many  hogsheads  then  in  from  his  country 
customers,  to  be  filled  with  liquor.  When  he  went -home, 
he  locked  up  the  doors,  leaving  the  distillery  to  his  new 
workmen.  As  soon  as  he  was  gone,  you  would  have  thought 
that  one  of  the  chambers  of  hell  had  been  transported  to 
earth,  with  all  its  inmates.  The  distillery  glowed  with  fires 
that  burned  hotter  than  ever  before  ;  and  the  figures  of  the 
demons  passing  to  and  fro,  and  leaping  and  yelling  in  the 
midst  of  their  work,  made  it  look  like  the  entrance  to  the 
bottomless  pit. 

Some  of  them  sat  astride  the  rafters,  over  the  heads  of 
the  others,  and  amused  themselves  with  blowing  flames 
out  of  their  mouths.  The  work  of  distilling  seemed  play 
to  them,  and  they  carried  it  on  with  supernatural  rapidity. 
It  was  hot  enough  to  have  boiled  the  molasses  in  any  part 
of  the  distillery ;  but  they  did  not  seem  to  mind  it  at  all. 
Some  lifted  the  hogsheads  as  easily  as  you  would  raise  a 
teacup,  and  turned  their  contents  into  the  proper  receptacles  ; 
some  scummed  the  boihng  liquids ;  some,  with  huge  ladles, 
dipped  the  smoking  fluid  from  the  different  vats,  and  raising 
it  high  in  the  air,  seemed  to  take  great  delight  in  watching 
the  fiery  stream,  as  they  spouted  it  back  again  ;  some 
drafted  the  distilled  liquor  into  empty  casks  and  hogsheads ; 
some  stirred  the  fires  ;  all  were  boisterous  and  horribly  pro- 


DEACON  Giles'  distillery.  109 

fane,  and  seemed  to  engage  in  their  work  with  such  familiar 
and  malignant  satisfaction,  that  I  concluded  the  business 
of  distilling  was  as  natural  as  hell,  and  must  have  originated 
there. 

I  gathered  from  their  talk  that  they  were  going  to  play  a 
trick  upon  the  Deacon,  that  should  cure  him  of  offering  rum. 
and  Bibles  to  his  workmen  ;  and  I  soon  found  out  from 
their  conversation  and  movements,  what  it  was.  They 
were  going  to  write  certain  inscriptions  on  all  his  rum 
casks,  that  should  remain  invisible  until  they  were  sold  by 
the  Deacon,  but  should  flame  out  in  characters  of  fire  as 
soon  as  they  were  broached  by  his  retailers,  or  exposed  for 
the  use  of  the  drunkards. 

When  they  had  filled  a  few  casks  with  liquor,  one  of 
them  took  a  great  coal  of  fire,  and  having  quenched  it  in  a 
mixture  of  rum  and  molasses,  proceeded  to  write,  appa- 
rently by  way  of  experiment,  upon  the  heads  of  the  differ- 
ent vessels.  Just  as  it  was  dawn,  they  left  off  work,  and 
all  vanished  together. 

In  the  morning  the  Deacon  was  puzzled  to  know  how 
the  workmen  got  out  of  the  distillery,  which  he  found  fast 
locked  as  he  had  left  it.  He  was  still  more  amazed  to  find 
that  they  had  done  more  work  in  one  night,  than  could 
have  been  accomplished,  in  the  ordinary  way,  in  three 
weeks.  He  pondered  the  thing  not  a  little,  and  almost 
concluded  that  it  was  the  work  of  supernatural  agents. 
At  any  rate,  they  had  done  so  much  that  he  thought  he 
could  aflbrd  to  attend  meeting  that  day,  as  it  was  the 
Sabbath.  Accordingly  he  went  to  church,  and  heard  his"' 
minister  say  that  God  could  pardon  sin  without  an  atone- 
ment, that  the  words  hell  and  devils  were  mere  figures  of 
speech,  and  that  all  men  would  certainly  be  saved.  He 
was  much  pleased,  and  inwardly  resolved  he  would  send 
his  minister  a  half  cask  of  wine  ;  and,  as  it  happened  to  be 
communion  Sabbath,  he  attended  meeting  all  day. 

In   the   evening  the  men  came   again,  and  again  the 


110 

Deacon  looked  them  in  to  themselves,  and  they  went  to 
work.  They  finished  all  his  molasses,  and  filled  all  his 
rum  barrels,  ajnd  kegs,  and  hogsheads,  with  liquor,  and 
marked  them  all,  as  on  the  preceding  night,  with  invisible 
inscriptions.     Most  of  the  titles  ran  thus  : — 

"  Consumption  sold  here.  Inquire  at  Deacon  Giles' 
Distillery.^'' 

"  Convulsions  and  epilepsies.  Inquire  at  Amos  Ones' 
Distillery.^'' 

"  Insanity  and  murder.  Inquire  at  Deacon  Giles''  Dis- 
tillery.^'' 

"  Dropsy  and  rheumatism."  *'  Putrid  fever,  and  cholera 
in  the  collapse.     Inquire  at  Amos  Giles''  Distillery.'''' 

"  Delirium  tremens.  Inquire  at  Deacon  Giles''  Distillery.''^ 

Many  of  the  casks  had  on  them  inscriptions  like  the  fol- 
lowing : — 

Y  Distilled  death  and  liquid  damnation."      "  The  Elixir 
\     of  Hell  for  the  bodies  of  those  whose  souls  are  coming 
there.'''' 

Some  of  the  demons  had  even  taken  sentences  from  the 
Scriptures,  and  marked  the  hogsheads  thus  : — 

"  Who  hath  wo  ?     Inquire  at  Deacon  Giles'  Distillery .^^ 
"  Who  hath  redness  of  eyes  ?     Inquire  at  Deacon  Giles'' 
Distillery.''^ 

Others  had  written  sentences  like  the  following: — 

"  A  potion  from  the  lake   of   fire  and  brimstone. 
\  Inquire  at  Deacon  Giles'  Distiller y.^^ 

All  these  inscriptions  burned,  when  visible,  a  ''  still  and 
awful  red."  One  of  the  most  terrible  in  its  appearance 
was  as  follows : — 

"  Weeping  and  wailing  and  gnashing  of  teeth.  Inquire 
at  Deacon  Giles''  Distillery.''^  . 


DISTILLERY.  Ill 

In  the  morning  the  workmen  vanished  as  before,  just  as 
it  was  dawn  ;  but  in  the  dusk  of  the  evening  they  came 
again,  and  told  the  Deacon  it  was  against  their  principles 
to  take  any  wages  for  work  done  between  Saturday  night 
and  Monday  morning,  and  as  they  could  not  stay  with  him 
any  longer,  he  was  welcome  to  what  they  had  done.  The 
Deacon  was  very  urgent  to  have  them  remain,  and  offered 
to  hire  them  for  the  season  at  any  wages,  but  they  would 
not.  So  he  thanked  them  and  they  went  away,  and  he 
saw  them  no  more. 

In  the  course  of  the  week  most  of  the  casks  were  sent 
into  the  country,  and  duly  hoisted  on  their  stoups,  in  con- 
spicuous situations,  in  the  taverns  and  groceries,  and  rum- 
shops.  But  no  sooner  had  the  first  glass  been  drawn  from 
any  of  them,  than  the  invisible  inscriptions  flamed  out  on 
the  cask-head  to  every  beholder.  ''CONSUMPTION 
SOLD  HERE.  DELIRIUM  TREMENS,  DAMNA- 
TION AND  HELL-FIRE."  The  drunkards  were  terri- 
fied from  the  dram-shops  ;  the  bar-rooms  were  emptied  of 
their  customers ;  but  in  their  place  a  gaping  crowd  filled 
every  store  that  possessed  a  cask  of  the  Deacon's  devil-dis- 
tilled liquor,  to  wonder  and  be  aflrighted  at  the  spectacle. 
For  no  art  could  efiace  the  inscriptions.  And  even  when 
the  liquor  was  drawn  into  new  casks,  the  same  deadly  let- 
ters broke  out  in  blue  and  red  flame  all  over  the  surface. 

The  rumsellers,  and  grocers,  and  tavern-keepers  were  full 
of  fury.  They  loaded  their  teams  with  the  accursed  liquor, 
and  drove  it  back  to  the  distillery.  All  around  and  before 
the  door  of  the  Deacon's  establishment  the  returned  casks 
were  piled  one  upon  another,  and  it  seemed  as  if  the  in- 
scriptions burned  brighter  than  ever.  Consumption,  Dam- 
nation, Death  and  Hell,  mingled  together  in  frightful  con- 
fusion; and  in  equal  prominence,  in  every  case,  flamed 
out  the  direction,  ''INQUIRE  AT  DEACON  GILES' 
DISTILLERY."  One  would  have  thought  that  the  bare 
sight  would  have  been  enough  to  terrify  every  drunkard 


112 

from  his  cups,  and  every  trader  from  the  dreadful  traffic 
in  ardent  spirits.  Indeed,  it  had  some  effect  for  a  time, 
but  it  was  not  lasting,  and  the  demons  knew  it  would  not 
be,  when  they  played  the  trick  ;  for  they  knew  the  Deacon 
would  continue  to  make  rum,  and  that  as  long  as  he  con- 
tinued to  make  it,  there  would  be  people  to  buy  and  drink 
it.     And  so  it  proved. 

The  Deacon  had  to  turn  a  vast  quantity  of  liquor  into 
the  streets,  and  burn  up  the  hogsheads  ;  and  his  distillery 
has  smelled  of  brimstone  ever  since  ;  but  he  would  not  give 
up  the  trade.  He  carries  it  on  still,  and  every  time  I  see 
his  advertisement,  "  Inquire  at  Amos  Giles^  Distillery^'* 
I  think  I  see  Hell  and  Damnation,  and  he,  the  proprietor 


DEACON  JONES'  BREWERY. 


Deacon  Jones,  from  early  lifei_had  been  a  distiller  of  ^y/ 
New  England  rum.    He  entered  on  the  business  when  every- 
body thought  it  was  a  calling  as  honest  as  the  miller's,  and 
he  grew  rich  by  it.     But  the  nature  of  his  occupation,  and 
the  wealth    he  was  gaining,  sadly  seared  his  conscience. 
Of  seven  promising  sons,  three  had  died  drunkards,  twoX 
were  lost  at  sea,  in  a  vessel  whose  cargo  was  rum  from  the   \ 
Deacon's  own  distillery,  and  two  were  living  at  home,  idle     i 
and  dissipated.     Yet  it  never  occurred  to  the  father  that 
he  himself  had  been  the  cause  of  all  this  misery  to  his  own 
family ;  he  was  even  wont  to  converse  with  great  resigna- 
tion on  the  subject  of  his  trials,  declaring  that  he  found 
comfort  in  the  passage  that  reads  that  "  whom  the  Lord 
lovcth  he  chasteneth,  and  scour ^eth  every  son  whom  he  re~ 
ceivethy     His  business  was  very  extensive,  and  he  plied 
the  trade  of  death  with  unremitting  assiduity. 

When  the  Temperance  Reformation  commenced,  Deacon 
Jones  took  ground  against  it.  He  declared  it  was  a  great 
piece  of  fanaticism.  He  was  once  heard  to  say,  that  if  the 
bones  of  his  ancestors  could  rattle  in  their  graves,  it  would 
be  to  hear  the  business  of  distilling  denounced  as  product- 
ive of  death  to  men's  bodies  and  damnation  to  their  souls. 
The  progress  of  the  reformation  was  so  rapid,  that  at 
length  he  began  to  see  that  it  must,  in  the  end,  greatly 
injure  his  business,  and  curtail  his  profits.  Moreover,  he 
did  not  feel  easy  on  the  score  of  conscience,  and  when  the 
members  of  the  Church  proceeded  to  excommunicate  a  dram- 


I 


114 

seller,  who  kept  his  grog-shop  open  on  the  Sabbath,  and 
had  been  in  the  habit  of  procuring  all  of  his  supplies  at 
the  Deacon's  distillery,  he  trembled  lest  his  brethren  should 
take  it  into  their  heads  that  the  business  of  distilling  was 
the  foundation  of  the  whole  evil.  It  was  said  that  he  was 
much  disturbed  by  an  article  in  the  newspaper,  which 
came  strongly  under  his  notice,  descriptive  of  the  immor- 
ality of  the  business  of  the  distiller,  and  ending  with  these 
words :  "  /  think  I  see  hell  and  damnation,  and  he  the 
proprietor.''^  For  a  long  time  the  deacon  could  not  enter 
his  distillery,  without  thinking  of  those  dreadful  words ;  he 
considered  them  so  profane,  that  he  thought  the  article 
ought  to  be  presented  as  a  nuisance  by  the  Grand  Jury. 

At  length  the  perplexities  of  conscience,  and  the  fears  of 
self-interest,  drove  him  to  think  seriously  of  quitting  the 
business.  One  afternoon,  as  he  was  sitting  at  home,  ab- 
sorbed in  thought,  a  loud,  impetuous  knock  at  the  door  of 
the  apartment  startled  him,  and  in  walked  one  of  the  most 
singular  personages  he  remembered  ever  to  have  seen.  It 
was  a  man  apparently  about  fifty  years  of  age,  very  short 
of  stature  and  sturdy  in  bulk,  with  a  countenance  that 
indicated  uncommon  shrewdness,  and  an  eye  of  preter- 
natural brilliancy  and  power.  Yet  his  features  were  ex- 
tremely irregular,  and  so  evidently  marked  with  strong  but 
compressed  passion,  as  to  put  one  in  mind  of  the  crater  of 
a  hushed  volcano  ;  in  truth,  his  face,  in  some  positions, 
almost  wore  the  aspect  of  a  fiend  escaped  from  the  infernal 
regions.  With  all  this,  he  could  assume,  if  he  chose,  a 
strange,  incongruous  appearance  of  humor ;  his  countenance 
had  that  expression  wiien  he  entered  the  room  where  the 
deacon  was  meditating. 

He  had  on  a  coat  of  blue  broadcloth,  of  the  fashion  of 
Queen  Anne's  age,  a  white  satin  waistcoat  with  enormous 
flaps,  covered  with  figures  of  dancing  satyrs  wrought  in 
crimson  silk,  and  pantaloons  of  red  velvet,  over  which  was 
drawn  a  pair  of  white-topped  boots,  that  reached  nearly  to 


BREWERY.  115 

his  knees,  with  feet  of  extraordinary  magnitude.  On  his 
head  was  a  three-cornered  adjutant's  hat,  which  he  raised 
with  an  easy  bow  as  he  entered.  His  salutation  to  the 
deacon  was  kindly  expressed,  though  in  a  very  deep,  start- 
ling voice,  that  seemed  as  if  it  came  almost  from  the.  centre 
of  the  earth.  He  told  the  Deacon  he  was  happy  to  see 
him,  and  that  knowing  he  was  somewhat  troubled  in  mind, 
he  had  called  to  help  him  out  of  his  perplexities. 

The  Deacon  looked  uneasy  at  this  address,  and  told 
his  Visitor  that  he  did  not  remember  ever  to  have  seen  him. 
Upon  that  the  man  laughed  very  extravagantly,  and  con- 
fessed it  was  not  strange  that  he  did  not  recognize  him : 
*'  but  no  matter  for  that,"  said  he,  "  I  think  I  can  certainly 
assure  you  that  I  am  without  doubt  the  best  friend  you 
have  in  the  world." 

The  Deacon  did  not  care  to  contradict  him,  especially  as 
his  face  just  then  looked  strangely  malignant ;  so  he  pro- 
ceeded to  draw  the  Deacon  into  a  long  conversation,  in 
which  the  man  in  blue  and  velvet  seemed  an  adept  in  the 
mystery  of  distilling,  and  a  friend  to  the  art.  The  Deacon 
told  him  all  his  trouble  in  regard  to  the  Temperance  Refor- 
mation. "  Not,"  said  he,  <'  that  I  dislike  the  thing  itself, 
in  the  abstract.  I  am  as  firm  a  temperance  man  as  any 
one.  But  really  they  do  adopt  such  hot-headed,  fanatical 
measures,  and  are  carrying  the  thing  to  such  an  extreme, 
that  it  is  enough  to  put  one  out  of  all  patience.  It  is  not 
strange  that  even  good  people  should  be  driven  to  oppose 
the  reformation  in  mere  self-defence.  I  am  for  temperance 
under  the  broad  banner  of  the  law  ;  and  the  law  protects 
the  business  of  distilling  as  much  as  it  does  any  business ; 
in  my  view  the  making  of  rum  is  just  as  honest  a  calling 
as  the  making  of  gunpowder." 

The  man  in  blue  acquiesced,  and  told  the  Deacon  he 
heartily  hated  these  Anti  Societies  for  the  purpose  of 
putting  down  particular  sins,  and  he  said  he  thought  a 
great  deal  more  injury  was  done  by  intemperate  WTiting 


V 


116 


than  by  intemperate  drinking.  Nevertheless  he  told  him 
that  he  thought  a  brewery  would  be  quite  as  profitable  as 
a  distillery,  and  that  the  business,  moreover,  would  work 
in  very  well,  just  then,  with  the  public  mind,  on  the  score 
of  temperance.  He  proposed  a  visit  to  the  deacon's  dis- 
tillery, and  told  him  he  thought  between  them  they  could 
contrive  a  new  and  convenient  disposure  of  the  whole 
establishment. 

Accordingly,  with  this  interesting  conversation,  they  pro- 
ceeded to  the  distillery,  and  after  examining  the  preriUfees, 
sat  down  in  the  Deacon's  counting-room,  in  which,  it  may 
be  remarked,  he  kept  a  copy  of  Bangs  on  Distillation,  but 
no  Bibles.  Here  again  they  had  a  long  conversation,  after 
which  the  man  in  blue  told  the  Deacon  that  if  he  would 
give  over  to  him  the  care  of  the  distillery  for  that  night, 
he  thought  he  could  make  it  a  good  temperance  specula- 
tion, and  arrange  matters  perfectly  to  his  mind.  By  this 
time  the  man  seemed  to  have  acquired  a  strange  power 
over  the  Deacon,  and  he  agreed  to  all  his  propositions 
without  much  delay.  So  the  workmen  retired  to  their 
homes  at  sundown,  and  the  Deacon  to  his,  leaving  the 
keys  of  the  distillery  and  counting-room  in  his  velvet 
friend's  possession. 

That  night  there  was  a  violent  thunder-storm,  and  the 
Deacon  slept  but  little.  Had  he  known  the  scenes  that 
were  transacting  in  his  distillery,  he  would  not  have  slept 
at  all.  The  stageman  who  drove  the  mail  passed  the 
distillery,  which  was  situated  on  the  main  road,  about 
midnight,  and  afterwards  declared,  that  through  the  win- 
dows of  the  distillery,  which  he  thought  burned  blue,  he 
could  see  a  crowd  of  wild  and  savage-looking  creatures 
hurrying  to  and  fro,  and  though  it  was  thundering  at  a 
fearful  rate,  he  could  hear  the  strangest  supernatural 
voices,  amidst  all  the  fury  of  the  storm.  This  was  prob- 
ably not  merely  the  man's  excited  imagination ;  for,  after 
the  Deacon's  departure,  as  night   drew  on,  the  distillery 


BREWERY.  117 

was  filled  with  demoniacal-looking  beings,  who  seemed  ripe 
even  for  a  midnight  murder,  and  all  under  the  control  of 
the  strange  man  left  by  the  Deacon  in  the  counting-room. 
It  was  soon  easy  to  perceive  by  their  movements  what 
was  their  object.  With  supernatural  strength  and  dex- 
terity they  proceeded  to  disorganize  the  whole  internal 
paraphernalia  of  the  Deacon's  establishment.  They  tore 
up  and  emptied  all  his  vats,  but  carefully  deposited  the 
dregs  and  filth  of  distillation,  wherever  they  found  it, 
in  a  large  muddy  cistern,  which  they  discovered  conven- 
iently disposed  at  one  end  of  the  distillery.  They  took  in 
pieces  the  whole  machinery  of  distillation,  and  by  a  wonder- 
ful metamorphosis,  they  so  re-modelled  its  parts  and  refitted 
the  vats,  as  to  make  them  admirably  suited  to  the  prooesseSs 
of  malting  and  brewing.  The  worm  of  the  still  they  un- 
coiled, but  sheathed  the  bottom  of  the  new  vats  with  the 
lead  that  came  out  of  it. 

Some  of  them  I  observed  were  busy  in  bringing  in  and 
piling  up  huge  bags  of  barley  ;  others  in  constructing  the 
furnaces  and  chambers  where  the  malt  was  to  be  dried ; 
others  in  filling  the  cistern,  into  which  the  dregs  of  the  vats 
had  been  poured,  with  dirty  water  dipped  from  a  stagnant 
pond,  covered  with  green  slime  and  infested  with  crawling 
reptiles,  hard  by  the  distillery.  They  set  the  barley  for 
malt,  and  so  peculiar  were  the  qualities  of  the  malting  mix- 
ture in  the  cistern,  and  so  admirable  the  skill  with  which 
they  had  prepared  the  furnace  and  floors  for  kiln-drying, 
that  a  process  was  accomplished  in  less  than  an  hour,  which 
ordinarily  demanded  some  days  for  its  completion.  The 
task  of  mashing  was  an  easy  one,  and  the  wort  was  drawn 
off*  and  boiled  down,  and  the  coolers  filled,  with  surprising 
celerity ;  and  to  crown  all,  they  set  the  liquor  for  fermenta- 
tion in  a  tun  of  prodigious  dimensions,  which  one  party  had 
been  engaged  in  constructing,  while  the  others  were  busied 
in  the  process  of  malting,  mashing,  boiling,  and  cooling. 

In  the  midst  of  all  this  astounding  bustle,  the   man   in 


118 

the  counting-room  was  neither  idle,  nor  satisfied  with  the 
mere  superintendence  of  his  energetic  workmen.  He 
stripped  off  his  broadcloth  and  velvet,  disencumbered  him- 
self of  his  huge  boots,  and  appeared  the  most  gaunt,  active, 
and  demoniacal  among  the  whole  crew.  They  leaped,  and 
grinned,  and  jibbered,  and  swore,  in  so  terrific  a  manner, 
that  it  seemed  as  if  the  thunder,  which  was  breaking  in 
such  tremendous  artillery  across  the  heavens,  would  have 
been  charged  to  peal  in  among  them,  for  their  horrible  pro- 
faneness. 

But  the  most  astonishing  scene  took  place  while  they 
boiled  down  the  liquor.  They  gathered  in  a  double  circle, 
and  danced  to  music  as  infernal  as  the  rhymes  they  chanted 
were  malignant,  amidst  the  bickering  flames  and  smoke  of 
the  furnace,  round  about  the  huge  copper  cauldron  of  boil- 
ing liquid,  into  which  each  of  them,  from  moment  to  mo- 
ment, adapting  the  action  to  the  words  they  sung,  threw 
such  ingredients  as  they  had  provided  for  the  occasion.  I 
shall  scarcely  be  credited,  while  I  relate  what  poisonous  and 
nauseous  drugs  they  cast  into  the  agitated  mixture.  Opium, 
henbane,  cocculus  indicus,  nux  vomica,  grains  of  paradise, 
and  Bohemian  rosemary  ;  aloes,  gentian,  quassia,  wormwood, 
and  treacle ;  capsicum,  cassia-buds,  isinglass,  cods-sounds, 
and  oil  of  vitriol,  were  dashed  in  turn  amidst  the  foaming 
mass  of  materials,  which  they  stirred  and  tasted,  scalding 
hot  as  it  was,  with  a  ferocious  exulting  delight  that  seemed 
to  increase  in  proportion  as  the  quality  of  its  properties 
grew  more  pernicious.  They  could  not  but  remind  me  of 
Shakspeare's  witches  on  the  blasted  heath  of  midnight,  when 
the  charm  was  brewing  for  Duncan's  murder.  Indeed  the 
song  they  sung,  as  they  leaped  about  the  cauldron,  and  threw 
in  their  infernal  mixtures,  was  so  similar  to  that  of  those 
"  secret,  black,  and  midnight  hags,"  when  they  were  going 
to  do  "  the  deed  without  a  name,"  that  I  think  the  chorus, 
in  which  they  all  joined,  must  have  been  gathered  from  some 
copy  of  the  beldams'  accursed  incantations.     They  repeated 


BREWERY.  119 

something  very  like  the  following  stanzas,  only  more  hor- 
rible : — 

1st  Demon. 

Round  about  the  cauldron  go, 

In  the  poisoned  entrails  throw  : 

Drugs,  that  in  the  coldest  veins, 

Shoot  incessant  iiery  pains  ; 

Herbs,  that,  brought  from  hell's  black  door, 

Do  its  business  slow  and  sure. 

All  in  Chorus. 

Double,  double,  toil  and  trouble ; 
Fire  burn,  and  cauldron  bubble. 

Several  Demons  successively,  1st,  2d,  3d,  (f-c. 

This  shall  scorch  and  sear  the  brain, 
This  shall  mad  the  heart  with  pain. 
This  shall  bloat  the  flesh  with  fire, 
This  eternal  thirst  inspire, 
This  shall  savage  lust  inflame. 
This  shall  steel  the  soul  to  shame, 
This  make  all  mankind  contend 
'Tis  their  generous  social  friend. 

All  in  Chorus. 

Double,  double,  toil  and  trouble, 
Fire  burn,  and  cauldron  bubble. 

2d  Demon. 

This  shall  brutalize  the  mind, 

And  to  the  corporal  frame  shall  bind 

Fell  disease  ef  every  kind ; 

Dropsies,  agues,  fierce  catarrhs, 

Pestilential  inward  wars. 

Fevers,  gouts,  convulsive  starts,  ^ 

Racking  spasms  in  vital  parts. 

And  men  shall  call  the  liquor  good. 

The  more  with  death  it  thicks  the  blood. 

All  in  Chorus. 

Double,  double,  toil  and  trouble, 
Fire  burn,  and  cauldron  bubble. 

All  the  Demons  in  F^uil  Chorus. 
Mortal !  yours  the  damning  sin ; 
Drink  the  maddening  mixture  in.  - 


120  DEACON    JONES'    BREWERY. 

It  shall  beat  with  fierce  control, 
All  the  pulses  of  the  soul. 
Sweet  the  poison,  love  it  well, 
As  the  common  path  to  hell. 
Let  the  charm  of  powerful  trouble. 
Like  a  hell-broth  boil,  and  bubble. 

Double,  double,  toil  and  trouble. 
Fire  burn,  and  cauldron  bubble. 

They  sung  these  devilish  curses  with  dreadfully  malig- 
nant satisfaction  ;  and  when  all  the  processes  in  the  prepa- 
ration of  the  liquor  were  finished,  with  equal  delight  they 
proceeded  to  draft  it  in  immense  quantities  into  hogsheads 
and  casks  of  every  dimension.  Into  every  vessel,  as  they 
filled  it,  they  put  a  certain  quantity  of  potash,  lime,  salt, 
and  sulphuric  acid,  and  then  drove  in  the  bung,  and  wrote 
upon  the  cask  head,  according  as  it  suited  their  fancy. 
Some  of  the  inscriptions  were  as  follows  : — 

"  BEST  LONDON  PORTER,  FROM  DEACON  JONES'  BREWERY." 

"  PALE  ALE,  OF  THE  PUREST  MATERL4LS." 

"TEMPERANCE  BEER  FROM  DEACON  JONES'  BREWERY." 

"MILD  AMERICAN  PORTER,  FOR  FAMILY  USE." 
"BEST  ALBANY  ALE,  FROM  DEACON  JONES'  BREWERY." 

They  also  filled  an  immense  multitude  of  bottles  from 
the  fermenting  tun,  and  packed  them  very  neatly  in  strong 
square  baskets,  which  they  labelled  in  shining  letters,  in 
these  words : — 

"  RESTORATIVE  FOR  WEAK  CONSTITUTIONS.— DEACON  JONES' 
BEST  BOTTLED  PORTER." 

A  very  queer  label,  as  I  thought,  was  used  by  some, 
and  that  was — 

"PALE  ALE  FOR  THE  NURSERY." 

This  work  was  finished  just  as  it  grew  towards  dawn, 
and  having  converted  the  Deacon's  old  distillery  into  an 
extensive  brewery,  they  all  vanished  from  the  building 
before  light,  in  the  same  unaccountable  manner  in  which 
they  came  into  it. 


lis* 

In  the  morning  the  deacon  walked  out  towards  the 
establishment,  not  a  little  disturbed  in  his  thoughts,  as  to 
what  might  have  been  going  on  over  night.  He  found  the 
outside  of  his  distillery  not  very  much  altered,  though  a 
number  of  new  windows  were  observable,  surmounted  with 
an  out-jutting  piece  of  plank  like  a  penthouse,  and  covered 
with  coarse  blinds,  through  which  the  steam  from  the 
brewery  was  pouring  in  volumes.  He  thought  likewise 
that  the  brick  walls  looked  larger  and  longer  than  ever 
before,  and  more  saturated  with  alcoholic  perspiration,  as 
though,  indeed,  they  might  have  taken  a  midnight  sweat. 
He  found  the  man  in  blue  and  velvet  walking  about  in  the 
clear  morning  air,  and  surveying  the  scene  apparently  with 
peculiar  satisfaction. 

Without  saying  a  word  the  man  took  the  Deacon  by  the 
arm,  and  led  him  into  the  building,  and  after  pointing  out 
all  the  extensive  transformations  and  additions,  which  had 
been  accomplished  during  the  night's  work,  he  threw  open 
the  doors  of  an  immense  store-room,  where  the  workmen 
had  filled  the  casks  of  liquor  for  the  Deacon,  after  the  mid- 
night brewing.  "  No\t,  Deacon,"  said  the  man,  with  a 
singularly  expressive  grin,  ^'  I  think  I  have  removed  all 
your  perplexities,  and  you  may  pursue  your  business  on 
temperance  grounds.  Meantime  we  will  be  just  as  good 
friends  as  ever  ;  for  I  do  assure  you,  that  as  long  as  you 
manage  this  brewery  as  I  have  begun  it,  you  avill  be 
DOING  MY  WORK  almost  as  effectually  as  you  were  while 
carrying  on  the  distillery."  With  that  he  politely  lifted 
his  three-cornered  hat,  passed  gravely  out  of  the  building, 
and  the  Deacon  saw  him  no  more. 

The  Deacon  was  greatly  puzzled.  He  knew  not  what  to 
think  of  his  strange  companion,  and  for  a  time  he  hardly 
knew  whether  to  be  glad  or  sorrj^  for  the  acquisition  of 
wealth  which  he  saw  before  him.  Especially  was  he  per- 
plexed by  the  language  of  the  man,  when  he  said,  "  You 
will  be  doing'  my  work."     He  could  not  tell  what  to  make 

6 


122  DEACON    JONES^    BREWERY. 

of  it,  and  it  troubled  him  not  a  little.  However,  he  soon 
became  absorbed  in  the  study  of  the  new  machinery,  and 
began  to  be  particularly  pleased  with  the  prodigious  size  of 
the  tun  for  fermentation,  and  the  vastness  of  the  well-filled 
store  room.  He  thought  he  could  almost  swim  a  revenue 
cutter  in  the  one,  and  pile  more  than  a  thousand  hogsheads 
in  the  other. 

In  the  course  of  the  day  he  got  busily  engaged  in  his 
brewery,  and  the  liquor  was  sent  into  all  parts  of  the 
country ;  and  wherever  it  came,  and  whoever  tasted  it,  it 
was  pronounced  the  most  delicious  of  all  intoxicating  mix- 
tures. Confirmed  drunkards  smacked  their  lips,  and  de- 
clared that  if  they  could  only  live  upon  such  liquor  as  that, 
they  would  never  touch  another  drop  of  New  England  rum 
in  the  world.  The  Deacon  was  very  much  pleased,  and 
some  time  afterwards  he  was  heard  to  say,  in  the  midst  of 
a  company  of  bloated  beer-drinkers,  that  Mr.  E.  C.  Delavan, 
of  Albany,  would  do  more  to  injure  the  temperance  refor- 
mation, by  his  ill-judged  crusades  against  wine  and  beer, 
than  he  had  ever  done  to  forward  it  by  all  his  energetic 
efforts  against  rum  and  brandy.  The  besotted  crew,  one  and 
all,  applauded  this  speech  of  the  Deacon,  declaring  that  he 
had  expressed  their  opinion  precisely ;  for  they  had  long 
thought  that  the  temperance  cause  was  greatly  suffering 
from  the  imprudence  and  misguided  zeal  of  its  professed 
friends. 

The  Deacon  continues  his  brewery  on  so  great  a  scale 
that  even  his  devil-built  fermentation-tun  is  hardly  large 
enough  to  supply  the  demands  of  his  customers.  It  is  said 
that  he  manufactures  the  best  "  Copenhagen  Porter"  in 
the  country ;  but  every  time  I  see  his  advertisement, 
"Inquire  at  Deacon  Jones'  Brewery,"  I  hear  again  the 
midnight  curses  of  the  demons,  and  think  of  the  dreadful 
meaning  of  their  leader's  language  to  the  Deacon,  "  You 

WILL  BE  DOING  MY  WORK." 


THE  HISTORY  OF  JOHN  STUBBS, 

A  WARNING  TO  RUM-SELLING  GROCERS. 


"  A  thing  betwixt  a  story  and  a  dream, — 
It  had  more  truth  than  fact,  more  fact  than  fiction. 


John  Stubbs  was  a  grocer,  wicked,  but  well  to  do  in  the 
world.  He  was  a  man  greedy  of  gain,  and  of  a  savage 
disposition.  He  used  to  beat  a  poor  little  orphan  boy  in  his 
possession  as  if  it  were  a  pastime,  until  the  child  suddenly 
disappeared,  when  Stubbs  asserted  that  he  had  gone  to  sea, 
but  from  that  hour  the  man's  brow  grew  blacker.  Some 
suspected  foul  play,  but  as  there  could  be  no  legal  investi- 
gation, the  thing  passed  off. 

John  Stubbs  sold  rum ;  indeed,  the  greater  part  of  hisH 
profits  were  made  in  that  way,  and  as  he  used  to  sell  on 
the  Sabbath,  he  often  made  more  money  that  day  than  any 
other  day  in  the  week.  Yet  you  never  seemed  to  notice 
the  shop  open  of  a  Sunday ;  the  shutters  were  all  closed, 
and  the  doors  were  closed,  there  being  a  nook  of  an  en- 
trance hard  by,  almost  out  of  sight,  where  the  rum-besotted 
wretches  of  the  neighborhood  could  glide  in  and  out  with- 
out disturbance.  Excluding  the  sunlight  from  his  dominions, 
John  Stubbs  went  about  among  his  casks  on  Sunday  with 
a  lamp  at  noonday.  On  such  occasions  Satan  might  have 
taken  him  for  one  of  his  own  demons,  and  the  darkened 
store,  with  its  half-revealed  paraphernalia  of  drunkenness, 
for  one  of  the  sootiest  chambers  in  the  bottomless  pit. 

John  Stubbs  did   not   merely  sell   rum — he   drank   it. 


124  THE    HISTORY    OF    JOHN    STUBBS. 

What  he  drank  did  not  intoxicate  him  ;  he  was  too  fond  of 
money  for  that ;  but  it  burned  in  him,  and  bloated  him, 
and  made  him  angry  as  fire.  A  poor  woman  came  into 
the  shop  one  day,  and  besought  him  to  sell  no  more  rum  to 
her  husband,  for  it  starved  the  children  and  made  the  house 
a  hell  beforehand.  "  That's  nothing  to  me,"  said  the  man ; 
"  he  don't  get  drunk  on  my  premises.  Drink  rum  your- 
self, and  then  you'll  agree."  A  good  man  in  the  neighbor- 
hood remonstrated  with  him,  and  another  brought  him  the 
temperance  pledge.  It  angered  him  prodigiously.  "  He 
was  not  going  to  have  his  liberty  curtailed  by  your  hypo- 
critical temperance  societies  and  your  psalm-singing  dea- 
cons, not  he  !  He  would  sell  rum,  and  drink  it  if  he  chose, 
though  all  the  devils  in  hell  were  burning  in  every  drop  of 
it."  His  shop  was  on  a  corner  and  had  a  parcel  of  chalk 
signs,  intermingled  with  herring  boxes  and  potato  barrels, 
ranged  on  the  outside. 

John  Stubbs  sold  rum  under  cover  of  Law,  and  that 
served  as  a  great  plaster  to  his  conscience  if  ever  it  needed 
one.  It  was  a  lawful  calling,  and  with  many  persons 
besides  rum-sellers  what  is  lawful  is  right  and  just,  and  as  a 
matter  of  course.  There  was  no  fifteen  gallon  law,  nor 
virtue  enough  in  the  community  to  sustaiu  it ;  and  though 
there  was  a  law  against  selling  liquor  on  the  Sabbath, 
John  Stubbs  felt  pretty  sure,  inasmuch  as  many  were 
known  to  violate  it,  and  yet  no  notice  was  taken  of  the 
violation,  that  he  would  not  be  disturbed  on  that  account. 
Besides,  I  am  not  sure  but  the  owner  of  the  building,  and 
John  Stubbs's  landlord,  was  a  member  of  a  church ;  and 
if  church-members  would  let  their  houses  to  rum-sellers  to 
sell  liquor  on  the  Sabbath,  it  was  hardly  to  be  expected 
that  the  police  would  interfere.  In  fact,  John  Stubbs  felt 
much  quieted  in  his  mind,  if  conscience  ever  did  reproach 
him,  by  considering  that  his  landlord  was  a  professor  of 
religion,  and  certainly  would  not  sanction  any  occupation 
that  was  very  sinful.    Besides,  John  Stubbs  had  argued,  at 


THE    HISTORY    OF    JOHN    STUBBS.  125 

a  time  when  he  really  did  debate  the  question,  that  if  he 
did  not  sell  liquor  others  would,  so  that  nothing  would  be 
gained  to  anybody  by  his  giving  up  the  traffic  ;  on  the  con- 
trary, somebody  would  be  sure  to  set  up  a  rum-grocery  at 
his  side,  and  perhaps  do  more  mischief  than  he  ;  so  that  on 
the  whole  it  was  a  gain  to  the  community  if  he  kept  up 
the  business.  Let  it  not  be  thought  that  ardent  spirits  was 
the  only  kind  of  strong  drink  sold  upon  John  Stubbs's 
premises  ;  there  was  a  good  array  of  wine-casks,  and  porter- 
casks,  and  strong  beer  and  cider. 

Now  it  happened  that  John  Stubbs  manufactured  his 
own  wine ;  so  that  those  customers  of  his  who  restricted 
themselves  to  the  use  of  that  kind  of  liquor,  were  by  far  the 
most  profitable  to  him,  inasmuch  as  they  received  ardent 
spirit  under  a  different  name,  at  a  far  higher  price  than  the 
poor  creatures  paid  for  it  who  drank  it  under  the  shape  of 
rum.  John  Stubbs's  enmity  against  the  temperance  society 
was  much  abated  by  that  circumstance. 

Things  went  on  in  this  way  a  long  time,  and  the  grocer 
made  a  great  deal  of  money ;  but  all  the  while  he  drank 
rum  himself;  and  though  he  had  an  iron  constitution,  and 
could  bear  a  great  deal,  those  who  observed  him  thought  it 
could  not  last.  Many  grocers  sell  rum  who  do  not  drink 
it ;  but  let  no  rum-selling  grocer  congratulate  himself  on 
this  point,  for  he  is  heaping  together  wealth  against  the 
last  day,  and  the  time  is  coming  when  the  rust  of  all  his 
money  gotten  in  this  dreadful  traffic  will  eat  into  his  soul 
like  a  fire,  ten  thousand  times  worse  than  that  which  now 
began  to  burn  in  the  veins  of  John  Stubbs.  There  is  some 
difference  whether  a  man  ruins  his  soul  by  drinking  or  by 
making  others  drink ;  but  of  two  grocers  who  sell  rum, 
one  of  whom  also  drinks,  but  the  other  is  sober,  I  doubt  if 
the  last  will  have  any  more  tolerable  place  in  hell  than  the 
first.  Indeed,  on  some  accounts,  it  is  more  wicked  for  a 
sober  man  to  sell  rum  than  a  drinking  one.  For  a  sober 
man  perfectly  well  knows  what  it  is  that  he  is  doing ;  he 


126  THE    HISTORY    OF    JOHN    STUBBS. 

does  it  with  his  eyes  open,  and  with  a  cool  calculation  for 
gain  ;  knowing  all  the  while  that  ninety-nine  hundredths 
of  the  liquor  he  sells  goes  to  make  drunkards. 

And  whereas,  some  grocers  say  that  though  they  do 
indeed  sell  rum  to  be  carried  away,  yet  they  do  not  allow 
any  to  be  drunk  on  the  premises,  and  do  not  sell  to  drunk- 
ards, yet  on  some  accounts  this  is  still  worse ;  for  they 
are  just  preparing  men  for  utter  ruin,  before  they  are  gone 
entirely.  They  are  pushing  them  on  from  that  stage 
where  they  might  have  been  reclaimed,  to  that  position 
where  there  will  no  longer  be  any  hope  of  reclaiming  them. 
They  are  making  men  drunkards  by  selling,  which  is  cer- 
tainly as  bad  as  to  sell  after  the  drunkards  are  made. 
Alas !  how  little  do  they  think  of  that  terrible  woe  from 
God,  so  definite,  so  explicit.  Woe  unto  him  that  giveth 
his  neighbor  drink,  that  putteth  thy  bottle  to  him,  and 
makest  him  drunken. 

One  bitter  cold  winter's  night,  the  woman  I  have  spoken 
of  above,  whose  child  had  been  smitten  with  a  sore  sick- 
ness, even  unto  death,  ventured  into  the  grocery  to  find 
her  husband.  She  had  no  money  even  to  buy  medicine  for 
her  poor  sick  boy ;  her  last  stick  of  wood  was  burning  in 
the  cold  chimney ;  and  she  was  as  wretched  a  woman  as 
could  well  be.  She  had  come  in  the  faint  hope  of  getting 
some  of  her  husband's  day's  wages  before  they  had  all 
gone  to  pay  up  his  score  for  drink  ;  but  in  vain ;  for  John 
Stubbs  told  her  he  did  not  believe  her  child  was  sick,  and 
swore  that  her  husband  should  not  stir  a  step  till  he  had 
paid  up  all ;  and  the  miserable  man,  finding  Stubbs'  shop 
a  warm  place,  and  his  liquor  warmer,  refused  himself  to 
move.  So  the  poor  wife  returned  back,  heart-broken,  to 
the  place  where  her  child  lay  dying.  She  must  have 
perished  in  her  misery  had  it  not  been  for  the  kindness  of 
a  neighbor,  for  that  night,  which  was  Friday,  the  child 
died. 

Saturday  evening,  after  laying  out  her  boy's  corpse  as 


THE    fflSTORY    OF    JOHN    STUBBS.  127 

decently  as  she  could,  she  summoned  courage  once  more  to 
visit  the  grocery ;  for  the  child  must  be  buried  the  next 
day,  and  as  yet  there  was  not  even  a  coffin.  In  the  height 
of  her  grief  she  could  not  help  telling  John  Stubbs,  that  if 
it  had  not  been  for  him  her  child  had  been  alive  and  well 
that  moment.  Hearing  this,  the  grocer  started  from 
among  his  casks  behind  the  counter,  and,  with  a  dreadful 
face,  swore  that  if  ever  he  had  anything  to  do  with  that  or 
any  other  child's  death,  all  the  devils  in  hell  might  burn 
him  and  his  shop  together.  This  phrase,  all  the  devils  in 
hell,  was  a  favorite  oath  with  John  Stubbs,  for  the  man 
was  awfully  profane,  and  so  in  general  were  those  who 
frequented  his  shop,  and  drank  his  liquor.  Something  had 
now  roused  the  devil  within  him  very  fearfully  ;  for,  laying 
hold  of  the  woman's  arm,  he  pushed  her  violently  out  into 
the  street,  and  cursed  the  time  he  had  ever  seen  either  her 
or  her  husband.  Well  nigh  dead  with  grief,  she  tottered 
home,  and  threw  herself  on  the  body  of  her  dead  child. 
There  her  brute  of  a  husband  found  her,  only  to  tell  her 
that  if  her  friends  would  not  help  her  to  a  coffin  and  bury 
the  child,  it  must  lay  there  all  winter,  for  he  had  no  money 
to  do  it.  In  God's  mercy  friends  were  found ;  and  Sabbath 
day,  while  John  Stubbs  was  selling  rum  by  lamp-light, 
that  little  boy  was  put  in  the  grave  beneath  the  cold  snow, 
and  the  clods  of  frozen  ground  sounded  to  the  mother's 
ears  like  pieces  of  sharp  iron,  as  they  fell  upon  the  coffin. 

That  same  night  John  Stubbs'  retribution  commenced. 
By  what  instrumentality  it  was  effected,  I  will  not  under- 
take to  determine ;  but  even  the  drunkards  dimly  noted  a 
fearful  connection  between  his  oaths  the  night  preceding, 
and  the  things  that  happened.  Late  in  the  evening,  just 
as,  with  trembling  hand,  for  John  Stubbs'  hand  had  begun 
at  length  to  tremble,  he  was  drawing  a  glass  of  liquor  for 
a  parting  customer,  his  eyes  were  almost  started  from  their 
sockets  by  the  sight  of  a  grinning,  snaky  figure,  in  flames, 
right  before  him.     Presently  the  air  began  to  be   full  of 


128  THE    HISTORY    OF    JOHN    STUBBS. 

them,  and  each  one  threw,  direct  at  John  Stubbs,  balls  of 
fire,  with  sharp  curling  snakes  protruding  out  of  them. 
Then  one  clutched  him  by  the  hair,  then  they  all  retreated 
to  the  wall,  and  began  crawling  along  and  hissing  in  such 
horrible  shapes,  that  Stubbs  cried  out  that  he  was  in  hell, 
and  the  fiends  were  burning  him.  So  it  continued  for  near 
an  hour,  till  every  inmate  of  the  shop  ran  out  of  it  in 
terror  at  his  shrieks  and  language.  Apparently  he  recov- 
ered, for  he  was  seen  shortly  by  the  watch  putting  up  a 
bar  outside  one  of  the  windows,  after  which  he  entered, 
closed  his  door,  and  did  not  again  open  it. 

About  two  o'clock  the  watchmen  were  alarmed  by  the 
I  sudden  appearance  of  a  bright  light  streaming  through 
every  crevice  into  the  street,  and  on  bursting  open  the  door 
the  shop  was  all  of  a  fierce  blaze,  and  there  lay,  blackened 
and  crisped  like  a  cinder,  but  on  the  floor,  where  the  fire 
was  not  blazing,  though  the  air  itself  seemed  all  flame,  the 
body  of  JohnStubbs.  From  the  position  and  appearance 
of  the  body,  and  the  horrible  stench  that  with  the  flames 
poured  out  of  the  shop,  there  was  no  doubt  that  Stubbs 
had  somehow  or  other  inadvertently  brought  the  flame  of 
the  lamp  in  contact  with  his  breath,  and  had  been  con- 
sumed, even  before  the  shop  itself  got  on  fire,  by  spon- 
taneous combustion.  Be  that  as  it  may,  the  flames 
increased  so  furiously,  by  the  casks  of  liquor  bursting  one 
after  another,  and  running  in  so  many  streams  of  fire  all 
over  the  shop,  that,  before  assistance  could  be  got,  it  was 
no  longer  possible  to  reach  the  body  ;  and  as  to  putting  out 
the  flames,  the  water  of  the  engines  was  of  no  more  use 
than  if  it  had  been  oil.  Blue  and  red  torrents  of  fire  shot 
up  into  the  sky,  and  some  averred  that  they  saw,  as  plain 
as  ever  they  beheld  anything  in  their  life,  the  body  of  John 
Stubbs  held  between  two  demons  in  the  vast  flickering 
blaze,  and  a  boy  piercing  his  heart  with  a  spear  of  red  hot 
iron.  Whether  this  was  mere  imagination  or  not,  perhaps 
it  was  very  natural   to   think   so  ;  and    certainly  all  the 


THE    HISTORY    OF    JOHN    STUBBS.  129 

figures  of  torture  that  the  spouting  and  roaring  flames 
could  form,  would  be  nothing  to  the  torment  of  a  damned 
soul  in  hell,  that  in  this  world,  as  it  is  to  be  feared  is  the 
case  with  all  rum-selling  grocers,  was  engaged  in  the  busi- 
ness of  preparing  the  bodies  and  souls  of  men  for  ever- 
lasting damnation.  It  is  fearful  even  to  use  the  words, 
but  if  so,  what  shall  be  said  of  the  business  ? 

6# 


PART  SECOND 


DESCRIPTIVE  AND  MEDITATIVE. 


What  time  the  daisy  decks  the  green, 

Thy  certain  voice  we  hear: 
Hast  thou  a  star  to  guide  thy  path, 

Or  mark  the  rolling  year? 
I  hear  thee  babbling  to  the  vale, 

Of  sunshine  and  of  flowers, 
But  unto  me  thou  bring'st  a  tale 

Of  visionary  hours. 


NOTES  OF  NATURE  AT  SARATOGA. 


This  is  a  morning  of  such  exquisite  brightness  and  beauty 
as  Adam  and  Eve  might  have  beheld  in  Paradise  before 
their  fall.  Some  things  are  still  left  in  this  world,  some 
aspects  of  nature,  that  seem  liker  heaven  than  earth,  and 
such  that  the  sons  of  God  might  shout  for  joy  to  behold 
them,  as  when  this  fair  creation  rose  out  of  chaos.  This 
morning  is  such  a  scene.  The  low,  lingering  clouds,  and 
the  dead,  close,  dog-day  weather,  are  swept  off  by  the  north- 
west wind,  and  everything  is  as  bright,  fresh  and  vivid,  as 
if  the  finger  of  God  had  just  touched  the  world  an-ew.  How 
brilliant  the  atmosphere !  It  reminds  us  of  the  saying  in 
Job  ;  "  fair  weather  cometh  out  of  the  North ;  with  God  is 
terrible  majesty."  The  connection  between  these  two 
phrases  is  singular,  but  in  some  seasons  and  changes  of  the 
atmosphere,  even  in  our  climate,  it  is  singularly  impressive. 
There  is  something  in  such  a  morning  as  this,  that  gives 
the  mind  a  vivid  image  of  the  radiant  glory  of  God  in  his 
holiness,  his  purity,  his  majesty. 

And  how  sweet,  how  full  of  enjoyment,  is  a  walk  in  the 
wild  woods  on  such  a  morning  !  The  trees  seem  to  enjoy 
it  as  much  as  we.  How  clearly  defined  is  everything  in 
the  bright,  clear  air.  And  the  shadows  themselves,  with 
what  distinct  outlines  they  fall  upon  the  green  grass  ! 
Those  tall  pines  seem  to  have  grown  higher  towards  heaven, 
and  the  clusters  of  cones  upon  their  topmost  branches,  like 
the  young  fruit  of  some  species  of  palms,  are  distinctly  vis- 
ible.    So  is  every  separate  brush  and  spire  of  the  foliage, 


134  NOTES  OF  NATURE  AT  SARATOGA. 

with  the  broad  leaves  of  the  oak,  glossy  and  lustrous  in  the 
sunshine,  as  if  it  had  just  been  raining ;  and  the  delicate 
leaf  of  the  maple,  and  the  pointed  leaf  and  round  green  nut 
of  the  hickory,  and  the  silvery  network  of  the  spruce,  with 
the  sun  shining  through  it,  and  the  gray  embossed  berries 
or  buds  on  the  spreading  hemlock  ; — you  can  see  them  all ; 
it  seems  as  if  the  light  penetrated  them,  and  as  if  they 
were  cut  out  from  the  solid  atmosphere.  There  are  several 
pines  in  the  grove  near  Congress  Spring,  which  are  truly 
magnificent ;  everybody  remembers  them,  and  how  they 
tower,  like  giant  sentinels,  over  the  whole  wood.  They 
seem  the  relics  of  the  primeval  forest,  and  remind  one  of 
those  tallest  pines  upon  Norwegian  hills,  of  which  Milton 
speaks  as  but  a  wand,  in  describing  the  spear  of  the  fallen 
Archangel.  What  majestic  trees  they  are  !  And  there  is 
a  most  picturesque  beauty  in  those  hemlocks  also,  notwith- 
standing the  angular  obstinacy  with  which  they  push  out 
their  snag-like  branches  into  the  air.  They  are  trees, 
which  Ruysdael  would  have  delighted  to  copy.  The  fir 
trees  are  not  so  remarkable,  but  still  most  beautiful.  And 
what  a  noble,  various  forest  may  be  constituted  out  of  our 
most  common  native  trees ;  the  oak,  the  pine,  the  fir,  the 
maple,  the  elm,  the  walnut,  the  hemlock,  the  cedar,  the 
birch,  and  the  beech,  sometimes  all  growing  together,  or 
within  a  very  little  distance,  and  affording  at  all  seasons  a 
wonderful  variety  of  verdure  ;  but  in  autumn,  when  the 
frost  begins  its  ministry,  making  such  a  gorgeous  mixture 
of  colors,  as  no  art  can  imitate,  nor  any  painter  describe. 

If  there  is  anything  in  nature  to  be  grateful  for,  it  is  such 
a  morning  as  this.  The  sunshine  in  the  atmosphere  is  like 
the  light  upon  the  soul,  when  "  God  shines  into  it,  to  give 
the  light  of  the  knowledge  of  his  glory,  in  the  face  of  Jesus 
Christ."     The  air  is  such, 

"  As  to  the  heart  inspires 
Vernal  delight  and  joy,  able  to  drive 
{  All  sadness  but  despair." 


NOTES  OF  NATURE  AT  SARATOGA.  135 

In  such  a  morning  in  the  soul  and  in  all  nature,  it  seems 
as  if  you  could  see  far  out  into  the  eternal  world  ;  as  if  the 
spiritual  world  and  the  natural  world  were  commingling ; 
or  as  if  the  latter  were  but  an  illuminated  veil,  through 
which  mortals  may  be  able  to  see  and  to  bear  the  glory  of 
the  former.  One  such  calm,  bright  morning,  is  able  to 
make  up  for  a  whole  year  of  toil,  dust,  and  noise  in  Broad- 
way. Perhaps  indeed  a  residence  in  the  great  city  pre- 
pares the  mind  and  heart  to  enjoy  with  a  keener  relish,  a 
more  sensitive,  intelligent  perception,  the  beauty  and  the 
meaning  of  rural  sights  and  sounds,  when  a  man  does  get 
amongst  them.  But  no !  a  man  must  dwell  much  with 
nature  to  read  her  lessons  aright,  or  he  must  have  been 
much  with  nature  in  the  wild  woods  in  early  years,  to  keep 
the  forms  and  habitudes  of  the  city  from  crusting  over  his 
interior  spiritual  perceptions  of  nature,  as  with  a  coat  of 
ice.  "  I  thank  God,"  a  man  should  say,  as  he  grows  into 
life,  "  for  every  impulse  which  the  grass,  the  trees,  the 
flowers,  the  running  brooks,  the  clouds,  awake  within  me. 
I  thank  him  that  he  does  not  suffer  to  die  away  from  my 
relish  and  admiration  the  rising  and  setting  glories  with 
which,  morning  and  evening,  he  fills  the  world.  I  thank 
him,  above  all,  that  if,  as  sense  grows  blunted,  and  decays 
by  age,  or  by  reason  of  nervous  derangement,  ceases  to 
represent  truly  the  forms  of  nature,  the  freshness  and  beauty 
of  this  visible  world  are  veiled  from  me,  there  is  still  no 
decay,  but  an  ever-during  increase,  in  the  power  of  faith, 
so  that  the  world  to  come  does  but  shine  brighter,  as  the 
world  that  now  is  fades  away.  Though  our  outward  man 
perish,  yet  the  inward  man  is  renewed  day  by  day.  I 
thank  God  that  the  light  of  this  world,  beautiful  though  it 
be,  is  but  a  symbol  of  that  radiance,  unspeakable  and  full 
of  glory,  which  his  Spirit  diffuses  through  the  soul." 

But  ah,  how  many  walk  in  the  light  of  this  world,  and 
enjoy  it,  whose  condemnation  it  is,  that  though  a  greater 
light  than  that  of  nature  has  come  into  the  world,  they 


136  NOTES    OF    NATURE    AT    SARATOGA. 

heed  it  not,  but  hate  it !  The  light  of  this  world,  which 
should  only  lead  to  the  greater  light,  as  but  an  emanation 
from  it,  they  use  instead  of  it.  And  thus  by  the  light  they 
pass  into  darkness.  This  is  the  history  of  our  fallen  world, 
under  the  light  of  nature,  as  detailed  by  the  Apostle  in  the 
first  chapter  of  his  Epistle  to  the  Romans. 

Pursued  aright,  how  various,  how  delightful,  how  solemn, 
how  instructive  is  the  study  of  nature !  It  is  the  study  of 
the  Divine  wisdom  and  goodness,  in  Creation  and  Provi- 
dence. Those  writers  whose  researches  and  productions 
assist  the  Christian  in  this  study,  and  direct  the  mind  ol 

J  the  observer  to  God,  confer   a  great  blessing  on  society  ; 

"S  while  those  philosophers,  so-called,  who  put  nature  as  a 

veil  or  wall  before  God,  are  but  using  their  knowledge  of 

,   his  works  to  make  infidels. 

"  Acquaint  thyself  with  God,  if  thou  wouldst  taste 
His  works.     Admitted  once  to  his  embrace 
Thou  shalt  perceive  that  thou  wast  blind  before. 
Thine  eye  shalt  be  instructed,  and  thine  heart, 
Made  pure,  shall  relish  with  divine  delight. 
Till  then  unfelt,  what  hands  divine  have  virrought." 

The  steps  are  plain,  from  nature  to  the  Author  of  na- 
ture and  to  his  natural  government ;  from  his  natural  to 
his  providential,  and  thence  to  his  moral  government  in  this 
world ;  thence  to  his  eternal  government.  The  light  of 
nature  grows  as  we  pursue  it,  till  it  meets  that  of  revelation 
and  is  absorbed  in  it,  and  both  carry  us  by  Faith  into  un- 
clouded, everlasting  day. 


NATURE  m  THE  BERKSHIRE  MOUNTAINS. 


There  are  few  places  more  beautiful  than  Williamstown. 
What  a  noble  range  of  dark,  verdant  mountains,  filling  the 
horizon,  rising  in  majestic  amphitheatres  on  all  sides  I 
How  deep  and  rich  the  hue  of  the  foliage,  how  varied  and 
soul-like  the  aspect  of  all  nature !  The  green  mountain 
slopes,  with  forest  glades  and  broad  pasturages,  mingled 
with  soft  meadows,  dotted  with  clumps  of  trees,  surround 
the  village,  and  form  a  scene  varying  in  beauty  with  every 
hour  in  the  day,  and  every  change  in  the  sunlight.  And 
what  a  change  does  the  sunlight  make  !  Take  a  day  like 
this,  of  clouds  somewhat  heavy,  and  threatening  rain,  with 
some  sprinklings  of  it  at  intervals,  and  you  may  ride  about, 
and  think  the  scenery  beautiful,  even  in  such  a  leaden, 
misty  atmosphere.  But  if,  as  to  day,  the  sun  comes  out 
at  evening,  if  the  clouds  are  swept  from  the  sky,  and  a  clear 
sunset  pours  its  golden  light  over  the  mountains,  and  bathes 
the  meadows,  the  trees  and  the  village,  it  seems  a  new  cre- 
ation. You  should  be  upon  the  hills  to  witness  the  break- 
ing of  this  sunset  from  west  to  east,  how  its  glory  travels 
down  into  the  valley,  and  up  the  richly  wooded  mountains, 
driving  away  the  mists,  or  setting  them  on  fire  among  the 
foliage. 

What  a  superb  position  is  this  for  a  College  !  I  cannot 
but  think  that  familiarity  with  such  scenery,  the  constant 
beholding  of  the  grand  forms  and  rich  hues  of  such  moun- 
tain ranges,  exerts  a  silent,  ceaseless  influence  in  building 
up  the  character,  even  though  the  soul  seem  unconscious 


138       NATURE  IN  THE  BERKSHIRE  MOUNTAINS. 

of  it.  No  place  is  more  favorable  for  witnessing  the  pro- 
cesses of  nature,  and  the  changes  of  the  seasons.  The 
gorgeousness  of  the  forests  in  Autnmn,  when  the  frost,  that 
magic  painter  of  the  foliage,  begins  to  change  their  hues, 
passes  all  description.  The  freaks  which  the  frost  plays 
upon  the  mountain  tops,  before  it  gets  down  into  the  val- 
ley, are  beautiful.  Sometimes  you  rise  in  the  morning  and 
see  the  summits  of  the  mountain  ranges  all  around  the 
horizon  tipped  with  white  frost,  a  girdle  of  glittering  rime, 
in  contrast  with  the  many-colored  foliage,  the  line  between 
the  frost  and  the  verdure  being  perfectly  distinct.  The 
mountain  called  Gray  lock,  receives  its  appellation  partly 
from  this  phenomenon,  it  being  the  highest  peak  in  this 
range,  and  receiving  the  Autumnal  baptism  of  frost  some- 
what earlier  than  any  other  portion  of  the  mountains.  Thus 
it  has  upon  its  forehaad  a  gray  lock,  like  that  upon  the 
head  of  Time  ;  and  since  the  clouds  rest  upon  its  summit 
often  when  they  do  not  descend  upon  any  lower  portion  of 
the  hills,  it  keeps  this  gray  lock,  between  the  action  of  the 
frost  and  the  mist,  almost  the  year  round.  You  cannot 
see  Gray  lock  from  the  village  of  Williamstown,  it  being 
hidden  in  the  Hopper,  by  a  lower  interposing  range  of  the 
Saddleback.  The  Hopper  is  the  name  given  to  the  infold- 
ing of  the  mountains,  where  they  come  together  in  shape 
like  the  receptacle  or  mouth  through  which  the  meal  pours 
from  the  millstones,  when  corn  is  grinding  ;  an  appellation 
about  as  appropriate  as  notch  to  a  vast  mountain  chasm, 
and  homelier  still.  It  must  be  confessed  that  there  is  a 
great  resemblance  between  this  formation  of  the  mountains, 
and  that  part  of  a  grist-mill  termed  the  hopper.  Doubt- 
less, it  was  the  village  miller  who  first  applied  the  name. 
Out  of  this  hopper  rises  the  majestic,  verdant  form  of  Gray- 
lock,  about  3500  feet  above  the  level  of  the  sea. 

The  rides  and  drives  in  all  this  region  are  delightful. 
New  and  picturesque  spots  of  calm  and  sometimes  romantic 
beauty  are  breaking  upon  you,  and  there  is  an  almost  in- 


NATURE  IN  THE  BERKSHIRE  MOUNTAINS.       139 

finite  variety  in  your  circuit  of  views.  From  the  mountain 
ranges  on  every  side,  at  a  very  easy  access  from  the  village? 
you  command  a  vast,  rich  and  varied  prospect.  Perhaps 
the  finest  view  of  the  valley  and  the  village  is  from  an  easy 
ascent  about  a  quarter  of  a  mile  from  the  Mansion  Hotel, 
especially  if  you  are  there  of  a  clear  sunset.  Or  if  you 
happen  to  be  upon  the  College  Observatory  at  the  same 
hour,  nothing  can  exceed  the  loveliness  with  which  the  rich 
evening  light  falls  aslant  upon  the  meadows  and  the  trees, 
and  almost  sets  on  fire  the  mountain  masses  of  verdure. 
Then  the  constantly  deepening  and  changing  shades  upon 
mountain  and  valley,  how  beautiful !  The  veiling  clouds 
and  the  breaking  sunlight  chase  each  other.  Evening, 
morning  and  noon,  have  their  sets  and  peculiarities  of  light 
and  shadow  ;  the  morning  with  its  freshness,  the  noon  with 
its  broad  and  still  solemnity,  the  evening  with  its  golden 
colors  deepening  into  the  twilight.  All  seasons  here  are 
times  for  meditation,  times  when  nature  gives  you  abun- 
dant food  for  thought,  and  materials  for  thanksgiving  and 
prayer. 

I  say  again,  how  beautiful,  how  admirable  is  such  a 
place,  as  the  situation  for  a  College.  The  young  student 
is  to  be  envied,  who,  with  a  keen  and  sensitive  perception 
of  the  beauties  of  nature,  has  his  lot  cast  here  for  the  four 
years  of  his  college  education.  It  ought  to  make  him  a 
better  and  a  wiser  man  all  his  life-time,  to  have  the  grand 
forms  of  these  mountains  before  him  at  such  a  period  of 
his  existence.  And  then  this  secluded  spot  is  so  shut  out 
from  the  dangers,  the  temptations,  the  examples,  of  large 
towns  and  cities  ;  it  is  much  to  be  praised  on  this  account. 

I  found  some  old  friends  here,  ruralizing  among  the 
mountains,  and  others  who  have  become  natives  of  Wil- 
liamstown  since  I  visited  this  region  before.  One  of  them, 
whose  family  was  absent  for  a  season,  met  me  with  a  rue- 
ful countenance  and  the  following  couplet,  which  was  all 


140       NATURE  IN  THE  BERKSHIRE  MOUNTAINS. 

he  recollected  of  a  whole  antique  poem,  but  which  had  got 
full  possession  of  his  mind : 

"  Home  is  a  solitary  place  for  one 
Who  loves  his  wife,  and  finds  her  gone." 

I  should  like  to  have  seen  the  whole  poem.  This  part 
of  it  will  never  be  forgotten  till  the  mountains  crumble. 

There  is  a  poetic  inspiration  in  the  scenery,  as  the  fol- 
lowing lines  will  prove,  given  to  me  by  a  friend  hitherto 
more  addicted  to  logic  and  metaphysics  than  poetry,  but 
who  cannot  resist  the  quickening  influences  of  nature  and 
of  early  recollections.  The  lines  were  the  result  of  a  walk 
by  the  meadow,  and  not  a  mere  philosophic  meditation  in 
the  closet.  A  soft,  quiet  meadow,  and  a  rippling  trout 
stream,  with  the  branches  of  the  willows  dipping  into  it, 
might  have  set  old  Izaak  Walton  himself  to  writing  poetry. 
As  to  fishing,  he  would  have  found  the  ground  pre-occupied, 
and  all  the  stock  taken  up ;  for,  though  there  are  plenty  of 
trout,  yet,  as  my  friend  told  me,  there  is  at  least  a  boy  to 
every  trout.  But  there  is  not  a  poet  to  every  meadow ; 
so  here  are  the  lines : — 

In  the  sunshine  lies  the  meadow, 

Sleeping  by  the  stream, 
A  soft  and  lovely  meadow 

Remembered  from  a  dream. 

A  dream  now  strangely  stirring — 

A  thought  that  springs  in  tears— 
The  lovely  past  recurring, 

A  dream  of  early  years. 

On  the  border  of  the  meadow 

Where  flows  that  happy  stream, 
There 's  many  a  flitting  shadow. 

And  many  a  dancing  gleam. 

For  the  bright  green  leaves  are  trembling 

In  the  gentle  summer  breeze, 
The  light  and  shade  commingling 

Beneath  the  willow  trees. 

The  stream  is  softly  flowing 
With  a  ripple  low  and  sweet, 


NATURE  IN  THE  BERKSHIRE  MOUNTAINS.       141 

Where  the  willow  branches  bowing 
The  lovely  waters  meet. 

And  in  the  ripple  hiding 

The  trout  securely  lies, 
Or  neath  the  green  bank  gliding 

Escapes  the  angler's  eyes. 

Here  the  meadow-larks  are  singing, 

And  the  cat-bird  and  the  jay, 
Harshly  or  softly  flinging 

Their  joyous  notes  away. 

And  hopping  there,  or  flying. 

With  happy  sounds  of  Ufe, 
The  insect  tribes  are  plying 

Their  puny  toil  and  strife. 

It  is  a  lonely  meadow, 

No  human  dwelling  near, 
A  green  and  pleasant  meadow, 

And  the  stream  is  cool  and  clear. 

This  meadow  is  no  strange  one, 

These  sounds  I've  heard  before; 
The  days  of  boyhood  bygone 

These  sounds  and  sights  restore. 

0  there  beneath  the  willow, 
Beside  a  gentle  stream. 

The  soft  grass  was  my  pillow. 
When  I  lay  me  down  to  dream. 

What  dreamt  I  in  the  meadow 

Beside  the  gentle  stream  1 
What  was  the  flitting  shadow. 

And  what  the  sunny  gleam  1 

1  may  not  tell — I  may  not  tell — 

'Tis  not  for  common  ears — 
But  who  like  me  hath  dreamt,  full  well 
Remembers  it  with  tears. 


NATURE    AT   ROCKAWAY. 


The  beach  is  cool  and  lonely.  The  margin  of  the  ocean, 
and  a  vast  tract  of  land  on  its  borders,  make  up  an  unin- 
habitable desert,  like  some  of  the  wastes  of  Egypt.  Scat- 
tered with  the  unavailing  attempts  of  Nature  to  spread  a 
carpet  of  tough  spiky  grass  over  the  sand,  the  region 
reminded  me  of  some  of  the  borders  of  the  Nile  near  the 
temples  of  Thebes,  except  that  here  there  are  no  palm 
trees,  nor  indeed  a  solitary  shrub  of  any  kind  for  some  dis- 
tance from  the  shore.  The  PaviHon,  on  the  edge  of  this 
desert,  commands  a  vast,  majestic  ocean  view,  of  undis- 
turbed sublimity.  To  get  to  the  beach  across  the  sand, 
you  have  a  rude  raised  walk  of  boards,  and  for  the  con- 
venience of  bathing  you  have  sundry  huts,  on  wheels  or 
stationary,  equally  rude,  with  tents  or  bowers  made  of 
fresh-cut  evergreens  and  dry  old  hemlocks  intermingled, 
where  you  may  recline  on  wooden  benches,  shielded  from 
the  sun,  and  gaze  upon  the  face  of  the  sea.  The  thunder 
of  the  surf  is  grand.  It  rolls  along  an  extent  of  six  or 
eight  miles  of  smooth  white  sand,  unbroken,  not  so  hard  to 
the  hoof  of  a  horse  as  some  beaches  you  may  have  walked 
upon,  but  broad,  level  and  beautiful.  Now  if  we  had  some 
tall  jagged  cliffs  for  the  surge  to  beat  against,  or  some 
fearful  ranges  of  breakers,  or  a  high  overhanging  promon- 
tory, from  which  to  watch  the  changes  of  ocean,  the  com- 
bination would  be  perfect. 

"  He  views  the  ships  that  come  and  go. 
Looking  so  like  to  living  things  j 


NATURE    AT    ROCKAWAY.  148 

O  !  'tis  a  proud  and  gallant  show 
Of  bright  and  broad-spread  wings, 
Flinging  a  glory  round  them,  as  they  keep 
Their  course  right  onward  thro'  the  unsounded  deep. 

"And  where  the  far-off  sand-bars  Hft 
Their  backs  in  long  and  narrow  line, 
The  breakers  shout,  and  leap,  and  shift, 
And  send  the  sparkling  brine 
Into  the  air :  then  rush  to  niimic  strife : — 
Glad  creatures  of  the  sea  !     How  all  seems  life !" 

Who  that  has  read  Mr.  Dana's  Poem  of  "  The  Buc- 
caneer," from  which  these  two  stanzas  are  taken,  and  then 
visited  a  sea-beach,  has  not  remembered  it,  and  thanked 
the  Poet  for  it  ?  Its  descriptions  are  admirably  vivid  and 
striking,  more  wild  and  imaginative  than  the  sketches  of 
sea-shore  scenery  from  the  accurate  pencil  of  Crabbe.  This 
beach  at  Rockaway  is  wild  and  lonely,  a  good  place  for 
Matthew  Lee  to  ride  with  his  spectre-horse,  and  out-run  the 
racing  surf,  and  see  the  ship  on  fire,  and  the  moon,  and  the 
mists.  But  there  are  no  dripping  rocks  for  Matthew  Lee 
to  climb  upon. 

"  In  thick  dark  nights  he'd  take  his  seat 

High  up  the  cliffs,  and  feel  them  shake, 
As  swung  the  sea  with  heavy  beat 
Below — and  hear  it  break 
With  savage  roar,  then  pause  and  gather  strength, 
And  then,  come  tumbling  in  its  swollen  length." 

The  sea  sometimes  rages  as  well  as  roars,  even  when  it 
is  not  stormy  at  Rockaway.  We  have  had  charming 
weather,  but  a  strong  south  wind  has  blown  the  sea  into 
such  furious  breakers  on  the  beach,  and  they  hurry  and 
race  one  after  the  other  with  such  impetuous  strife,  and 
high  tide  of  commotion,  that  it  is  almost  like  a  tempest. 
Each  wave  behind  seems  flying  to  devour  and  swallow  up 
the  one  preceding  it.  In  they  come,  with  such  a  rush, 
tumble  and  confusion,  as  makes  the  white  yeasty  waters 
boil  and  foam  as  if  the  tail  of  Leviathan  had  stirred  them. 

This  is  a  capital  surf  to  bathe  in.     You  should  have  a 


144  NATURE    AT    ROCKAWAY. 

life  preserver  or  swimming  belt,  and  then  you  may  go  far 
out,  and  enjoy  it  fully.  You  ride  upon  the  great  crested 
waves  like  a  sea-gull,  and  they  swing  you  about,  or  send 
you  dancing  in  upon  the  beach,  or  burst  over  you  like  a 
cataract,  and  still  you  rise,  as  if  with  elastic  rebound  they 
were  tossing  you  into  the  air,  instead  of  seeking  to  smother 
you.  It  is  fine  invigorating  sport.  And  there  is  probably 
something  in  the  beat  of  the  briny  surf,  as  it  strikes  upon 
you,  that  aids  the  ordinary  bracing  action  of  a  salt  water 
bath.  Then,  too,  the  exercise  of  swimming  is  so  admirable ! 
Three  times  a  day  we  have  followed  it  up,  till  a  keg  of 
pickled  beef  was  scarcely  ever  better  salted.  Besides,  the 
air  itself  has  been  so  saturated  with  salt  moisture  in  the 
prevalence  of  this  fresh  south  breeze,  that  our  clothes  have 
almost  gotten  stiff  with  salt ;  a  little  more,  and  we  should 
be  fine  specimens  of  incrustations. 

But  the  perfection  of  beauty  and  enjoyment  in  this  scene, 
and  in  the  bathing,  also,  is  by  moonlight.  How  beautiful 
the  ocean,  with  the  white-crested  tops  of  the  waves  rolling 
in  upon  the  beach  beneath  the  fall  moon,  the  smooth  sand 
glittering  like  a  steel  or  silver  floor,  the  shells  themselves  and 
the  wave- worn  stones  shining  like  silver  pebbles  in  mosaic, 
with  the  creamy  foam  of  the  sea  sparkling  over  them,  and 
the  melancholy  little  beach-birds  running  among  them  !  In 
the  direction  of  the  moon,  the  sea  almost  blazes  with  her 
lines  of  silvery  light,  while  in  the  other  quarter  of  the  hor- 
izon it  looks  black  and  terrible.  There  in  the  distance, 
far  over  the  dark  waves,  you  see  the  two  red  lights  that  on 
the  Jersey  shore  instruct  and  warn  the  mariner.  One  of 
these  lights  is  fixed,  the  other  is  revolving  ;  emblems,  you 
may  think,  of  the  difference  between  the  immutability  of 
religious  truth  in  the  word  of  God,  and  in  changing  human 
experience.  See !  you  never  lose  sight  of  one ;  there  it 
shines,  with  a  steady,  changeless  lustre.  But  the  other 
disappears.  Now  it  is  gone,  now  it  shines  again.  They 
look  alike,  when  you  see  them  together,  but  the  one  is 
revolving  and  partial,  the  other  is  stationary  and  perpetual. 


NATURE  IN  A  TROPICAL  VOYAGE  AT  SEA. 


When  you  come  to  the  news  of  a  trial  that  had  been 
waiting  for  you,  while  in  ignorance  of  it  you  had  been 
going  on  in  an  easy  if  not  happy  mood,  in  the  enjoyment 
of  God's  mercies,  you  seem  to  yourself  to  have  done  wrong 
in  not  being  afflicted  beforehand.  This  is  especially  the 
case,  if  you  find  that  God's  hand  has  been  laid  in  affliction 
on  those  dear  to  you.  So  there  seems  something  inconsist- 
ent in  your  having  a  delightful  voyage,  when  even  before 
it  commenced  God  had  clothed  you  in  unconscious  mourn- 
ing.    Nevertheless,  this  makes  no  difference  in  his  mercy. 

We  had  indeed  a  delightful  voyage,  and  I  mention  it,  to 
suggest  the  same  voyage  to  those  who,  returning  from 
Europe  in  the  autumn,  may  dread  the  roughness  of  a 
northern  passage,  and  the  cold  and  perils  of  our  coast  in 
that  season.  In  a  few  days  from  our  leaving  Havre,  we 
found  ourselves  in  a  mild  and  balmy  atmosphere,  in  delicious 
weather,  in  smooth  seas,  under  the  influence  of  a  wind  so 
prosperous  and  invariable  that  sometimes  a  ship  may  run 
before  it  for  weeks  without  changing  a  sail.  You  can 
scarcely  conceive  anything  connected  with  the  sea,  more 
delightful  than  crossing  the  ocean  in  this  manner.  Evening 
after  evening  the  day  closed  with  such  magnificent  sunsets, 
as  only  at  sea  between  the  tropics  you  can  ever  witness, 
and  morning  after  morning  the  dawn  broke,  and  the  sun 
rose,  with  a  beauty  and  a  glory,  which  to  see  but  once 
would  be  worth  a  voyage  to  Europe,  if  you  could  see  it  in 
no  other  way.     In  all  this  lovely  weather  we  had  a  lovely 

7 


146  NATURE    m    A    TKOPICAL    VOYAGE    AT   SEA, 

moon,  and  we  watched  her  course  from  the  pale  silver 
thread  that  at  first  scarcely  outshone  the  star  that  sailed 
with  her  in  the  heavens,  to  the  i^plendor  of  her  fulness ; 
and  what  can  he  more  beautiful  than  the  full  moon  in  a 
summer  latitude  at  sea  ?  What  more  beautiful  than  such 
a  moon  rising  from  the  sea  amidst  lovely  sailing  clouds  into 
the  deep  heaven,  and  creating  that  long,  tremulous  line  of 
light  between  the  ship  and  the  horizon,  in  which  the  waves 
roll  like  liquid  gold  ?  And  what  more  beautiful  than  to 
witness,  in  a  calm  summer^s  night,  a  total  eclipse  of  such 
a  moon  riding  in  mid  heaven  ?  And  then,  again,  what 
more  beautiful  than  to  watch  the  moon  and  stars  contending 
in  their  lustre  with  the  breaking  dawn  and  lost  so  gradually 
and  softly  in  the  advancing  splendor  of  the  sunrise  ? 

The  phenomenon  of  the  eclipse  we  witnessed  about  the 
middle  of  our  passage ;  it  was  indescribably  beautiful,  and 
as  solemn  as  beautiful,  to  see  the  veil  drawn  over  the  face 
of  the  planet  as  by  the  hand  of  God,  to  see  the  stars  come 
out,  and  darkness  settle  over  the  waste  of  waters,  and  then 
again  the  veil  slowly  withdrawn,  the  stars  hidden,  and  a 
mild,  pale  lustre  diffused  upon  the  bosom  of  the  deep.  And 
we,  the  watchers  in  this  solitary  ship,  marking  this  solemn 
scene,  shall  it  not  make  us  feel  how  easily  God  can  veil 
our  life  in  darkness — can  put,  if  he  pleases,  the  light  of  our 
eyes  far  from  us  ?  When  He  giveth  quietness,  who  then 
can  make  trouble  ?  and  when  He  hideth  his  face,  who  then 
can  behold  him  ?  whether  it  be  done  against  a  nation,  or 
against  a  man  only  ?  The  hiding  of  God's  face  !  If  men 
saw  and  felt  it  as  clearly  as  they  see  the  darkening  of  the 
heavenly  bodies  in  an  eclipse,  what  grief  and  consternation 
would  it  spread  over  the  world !  But  men  care  little  for 
the  darkness,  who  have  never  seen  or  known  the  light. 
And  this,  alas,  is  the  case  with  most  men  in  reference  to 
God. 

It  was  near  the  middle  of  December  when  we  arrived 
amidst  the  Bahama  islands  and  banks,  the  weather  still 


NATURE    IN    A    TROPICAL    VOYAGE    AT    SEA.  147 

continuing  delightful,  and  the  wind  fair.  The  passage 
across  the  banks  is  sometimes  not  unattended  with  danger, 
and  it  may  well  make  a  seafaring  man  anxious,  when  his 
vessel  passes  suddenly  from  deep  water  into  the  midst  of  a 
shoal  where  the  ship's  keel  is  but  a  foot  or  two  from  the 
bottom.  All  the  way  across  the  banks  you  hear  the  deep, 
melancholy  voice  of  the  leadsman,  as  he  heaves  the  line 
and  announces  the  fathoms  deep,  and  all  the  way  you  can 
see  the  dark  sponges  on  the  white  sand,  like  tufts  of  ever- 
green in  the  desert.  There  are  fearful  jagged  reefs  on  the 
edges  of  the  banks,  which,  as  we  passed  them  towards 
evening,  looked  in  the  horizon  like  the  ruins  of  an  ancient 
city.  It  W£is  almost  calm,  yet  the  spray  was  dashing  high 
upon  them,  and  we  were  glad  when  again  we  had  plenty 
of  sea-room  between  our  little  ship  and  the  grim  forms  of 
such  dangerous  breakers. 

We  arrived  in  safety,  by  the  mercy  of  God,  although  a 
tempestuous  night  which  we  had  to  spend  about  twenty 
miles  from  the  shores  of  Cuba,  made  all  on  board  anxious, 
and  made  me  think  of  the  solemn  lines  of  Dante  ;  solemn 
they  are  at  sea,  when  you  are  getting  to  the  close  of  your 
voyage,  since  a  vessel's  perils  increase  with  every  league 
by  which  she  nears  the  coast. 

For  I  have  seen  the  ship  that  o'er  the  sea 
Ran  safe  and  speedy,  perish  at  the  last, 
Even  in  the  harbor's  mouth. 

So  it  is  often  with  our  plans  of  happiness  and  usefulness  in 
life,  of  the  wreck  of  which,  however,  we  are  ourselves  too 
frequently  the  cause,  and  can  only  suffer  silently  in  the 
light  of  an  experience  "  which  does  but  illumine  the  path 
that  has  been  passed  over."  But  there  is  a  brighter  side 
to  Dante's  lines,  for  he  says  also  that  he  has  seen  many  a 
bush,  which  through  the  winter  showed  nothing  but  un- 
sightly sticks  and  thorns. 

Bear  yet  the  lovely  rose  upon  its  top.  .  ^  ,: 


14S 


NATURE    IN    A    TROPICAL    VOYAGE    AT    SEA. 


There  are  plants,  for  which  this  world  is  all  winter,  and  of 
which  you  will  never  see  the  rose,  till  you  find  it  blossom- 
ing in  heaven. 

I  wish  again  to  recommend  this  tropical  voyage  from 
Europe  to  the  West  Indies,  for  any  persons  of  delicate  health 
or  constitution,  who  are  obliged  to  return  to  the  United 
States  late  in  the  Autumn.  True,  it  takes  a  longer  time, 
but  the  most  fatal  mistakes  are  sometimes  made  with  in- 
valids for  want  of  a  little  longer  time,  and  there  is  often 
the  most  fatal  choice  of  the  season  for  a  voyage.  I  lately 
perused  a  most  affecting  manuscript  journal  of  a  young 
clergyman,  who  in  pursuit  of  health  left  a  circle  of  dear 
friends,  a  warm  fireside,  and  every  comfort,  in  the  month 
of  December,  on  a  voyage  to  the  Mediterranean,  in  a  ship, 
of  which  the  cabin  itself  had  like  to  have  proved  his  grave 
in  the  outward  voyage,  being  close,  damp,  cold.  By  this 
and  the  boisterous  weather,  he  found  himself  more  ill  than 
He  probably  would  have  been  on  shore,  even  in  winter. 
Then,  after  this,  having  recruited  a  little  in  the  south  of 
France,  which  itself,  Marseilles  at  least,  is  a  miserable 
climate  in  winter,  he  undertook  to  return  in  the  month 
of  February,  but  never  reached  the  land,  though  the  ship 
arrived  in  safety. 

A  mild  and  somewhat  dry  air  at  sea  is  requisite  for  such 
an  invalid,  and  if  he  cannot  go  in  such  a  latitude  or  such  a 
season  as  to  secure  this,  it  would  be  better  to  remain  at 
home,  or  go  to  the  South  by  land.  A  voyage  from  Cuba 
to  the  Mediterranean  in  the  spring,  or  from  the  Mediter- 
ranean to  Cuba  in  the  Autumn  or  Winter,  is  delightful,  and 
ordinarily  it  is  one  of  the  safest  voyages  in  the  world; 
where,  if  halcyon  birds  of  calm  do  not  sit  brooding  on  the 
wave,  it  is  not  because  it  is  too  troubled,  for  the  breeze, 
which  fans  your  temples  like  the  west  wind  in  June, 
keeps  it  in  such  steady  and  playful  motion,  that  it  would 
rock  the  black  duck,  with  her  glossy  wing,  like  a  cradle. 

Among  the  many  instructive  lessons  which  a  mind  so 


NATURE    IN    A    TROPICAL    VOYAGE    AT    SEA.      .  149 

disposed  may  learn  at  sea,  that  of  self-examination  is  an 
impressive  one.  A  soul  on  the  voyage  of  life  must  know 
its  motives,  and  its  besetting  sins  and  dangers.  There  are 
so  many  under-currents,  of  which,  if  a  man  be  ignorant, 
let  his  sails  and  his  helm  be  as  they  may,  he  will  go  to 
destruction.  It  is  not  enough  that  the  ship's  course  be  set 
right,  and  her  helm  kept  steady.  Sailing  from  Cuba,  we 
thought  we  had  gained  on  our  course,  one  day,  about  sixty 
miles,  but  at  the  next  observation  found  we  had  lost  more 
than  thirty.  It  was  an  unknown  current.  The  ship  had 
really  been  going  forward  with  the  wind,  but  going  back 
likewise  with  the  current.  Under  certain  circumstances, 
unless  such  a  current  were  taken  into  consideration  in 
setting  a  ship's  course,  she  would  be  wrecked,  with  ever  so 
fair  a  wind.  So  with  the  heart  and  its  motives.  A  man's 
course  may  seem  to  be  set  right,  with  a  fair  wind  towards 
heaven,  but  what  is  the  under-current,  what  is  its  direc- 
tion ?  Which  way  is  his  inward  existence  moving  ?  And 
how  far  may  the  needle  in  his  compass  be  turned  out  of  its 
course,  by  the  concealed  loadstone  of  self-interest  ?  . 


THE  DISCONTENTED  LADY-BIRD, 


A    PROVERB    ILLUSTRATED 


It  is  an  active  thing,  that  bath  much  meaning  in  it, — that 
old  proverb, — A  rolling'  stone  gathers  no  moss.  It  re- 
minds me  of  Homer's  Kulindeto.  The  application  of  it 
may  be  abused,  for  it  might  seem  to  sanction  sluggishness, 
and  the  want  of  energy  and  enterprise  ;  a  little  more  sleep, 
a  little  more  slumber  ;  a  soft  bed  of  moss  is  a  very  pleasant 
thing  for  a  stone  to  recline  upon.  Pity  to  disturb  it  by 
rolling. 

But  there  is  a  side  of  bright  truth  to  this  proverb,  and  a 
sin  of  restlessness,  change,  and  discontent  in  man,  which  it 
condemns.  Men  are  never  satisfied  with  the  dispensations 
of  Providence  towards  them,  and  instead  of  asking.  How 
may  I  make  the  most  out  of  my  present  situation,  and  do  the 
most  good  in  it  ?  they  are  always  uneasy,  always  ready  for 
a  change.  Meddle  not  with  a  man  given  to  change.  Rep- 
utation is  a  thing  of  gradual  growth  ;  it  comes  from  ac- 
quaintance, from  stability,  from  habit ;  if  it  be  good,  let  a 
man  stay  by  it.  It  is  the  house  of  his  character,  and  three 
removes  are  equal  to  one  fire. 

Steadiness  of  purpose,  with  a  contented  mind,  is  worth 
more  than  a  great  many  shining  qualities,  that  are  not  so 
stable.  I  shall  try  to  illustrate  this  for  the  little  children, 
and  therefore  we  must  put  our  proverb  into  a  parable. 

There  was  once  a  little  Robin  Readbreast,  very  fickle- 
minded  and  fanciful.     It  was  a  wonder  to  everybody  how 


THE    DISCONTENTED    LADY-BIRD.  151 

she  could  ever  fix  upon  a  husband,  and  how  any  bird  that 
valued  his  own  family  happiness,  and  knew  anything  of  her 
character,  could  take  her  to  wife.  However,  she  was  very 
pretty,  with  a  very  sweet  voice,  and  a  little  roving  Robin 
fell  in  love  with  her,  and  in  the  Spring-time  they  were, 
married,  and  went  to  making  their  nest.  Little  master 
Robin  worked  like  a  good  fellow,  early  and  late,  and  they 
had  nearly  got  the  nest  finished,  in  fine  time  for  the  sum- 
mer season,  when  the  Lady-bird  discovered  a  thorn  in  it, 
which  it  was  difficult  to  remove,  without  breaking  it  up, 
and  so  persuaded  her  husband  to  abandon  it. 

Then  they  went  to  w^ork  upon  another,  but  no  sooner  had 
they  got  it  nicely  feathered,  and  warm  and  comfortable, 
than  the  discontented  Lady-bird  found  that  it  was  too  high 
in  the  tree,  and  that  a  strong  wind  would  overset  it.  So 
she  persuaded  her  husband  to  abandon  that  also.  Then 
they  commenced  another  in  the  centre  of  a  barberry  bush, 
where  it  would  be  very  difficult  for  any  school-boy  to  come  • 
at  it ;  and  they  had  just  got  it  almost  ready  for  their  abode, 
when  the  Lady-bird,  returning  one  day  from  a  visit,  told  her 
husband,  who  had  been  working  hard  all  day  to  finish  the 
nest,  and  had  even  got  a  company  of  upholsterers  to  help 
him,  that  the  materials  out  of  which  they  had  built  it  were 
.so  far  inferior  to  their  neighbors',  and  so  unfashionable,  that 
it  would  never  do  to  dwell  in  it ;  all  their  friends,  she 
affirmed,  would  cut  their  acquaintance.  So,  by  dint  of 
much  complaining,  she  persuaded  her  mate  to  abandon  that 
also. 

Now  there  was  a  wise  old  owl  in  that  neighborhood,  that 
had  been  watching  their  proceedings,  and  one  day,  when 
they  came  near  his  nest  to  gather  some  down  and  soft  moss 
for  another  of  their  own,  he  thus  addressed  them.  "  Silly 
birds  !  Do  you  not  see  how  the  season  is  advancing,  and 
with  every  change  you  are  losing  in  time  more  than  you 
are  gaining  in  taste  ?  See  how  the  very  berries  on  your 
Barberry-bush  are  becoming  red  with  the  approach  of  Au- 


152  THE    DISCONTENTED    LADY-BIRD. 

tumn !  By  the  time  you  get  satisfied  with  your  nest,  the 
warm  months  will  be  over,  and  then  what  will  you  do  with 
your  young  ?  Had  you  been  contented  with  your  first  situ- 
ation, you  might  by  this  time  have  had  a  family  of  songsters 
about  you,  all  provided  for.  But  you  will  never  be  happy 
so  given  to  change,  for  a  rolling  stone  gathers  no  moss,  and 
your  discontent  is  always  preventing  you  from  realizing  the 
happiness  that  you  might  enjoy  in  life. 

"  And  let  me  tell  you,  pretty  Mrs.  Robin  Redbreast,'' 
said  he  to  the  Lady-bird,  "  that  if  you  go  on  giving  your- 
self such  airs,  instead  of  contentedly  helping  your  good- 
natured  husband  in  his  efforts  to  provide  for  your  heirs,  you 
will  never  have  a  family,  though  you  live  to  be  as  old  as 
the  Phoenix." 

The  Lady-bird  tossed  up  her  head  at  this,  and  flew  off, 
declaring  that  she  never  heard  such  a  miserable  pun  in  all 
her  life.  But  Master  Robin  was  very  much  mortified. 
And  it  turned  out  just  as  the  old  owl  had  predicted  ;  for 
though  these  two  Robins  at  length  got  settled,  and  had  a 
couple  of  little  bright  speckled  eggs  shining  in  their  nest, 
yet  it  was  so  late,  that  one  frosty  morning,  just  after  the 
young  had  broken  their  shells,  and  while  the  parents  were 
looking  up  a  few  seeds  and  worms  for  breakfast,  the  poor 
little  things  were  so  badly  chilled  that  they  died ;  and  then, 
in  the  first  emigration,  the  bereaved  Robins  had  to  go  off  to 
the  tropics  in  mourning. 


SECRET  OF  SUCCESS  IN  PREACHING. 


Fletcher  of  Madely  was  one  of  the  most  earnest  and  suc- 
cessful of  preachers.  He  was  a  man  of  prayer,  much  prayer, 
and  herein  lay  the  secret  of  his  power.  His  biographer  tells 
us,  that  "  his  preaching  was  perpetually  preceded,  accom- 
panied, and  succeeded  by  prayer.  Before  he  entered  upon 
the  performance  of  his  duty,  he  requested  of  the  great  Mas- 
ter of  Assemblies  a  subject  adapted  to  the  conditions  of  his 
people  ;  earnestly  soliciting  for  himself  wisdom,  utterance, 
and  power ;  for  them  a  serious  frame,  an  unprejudiced 
mind,  and  a  retentive  heart.  The  necessary  preparation  for 
the  profitable  performance  of  his  ministerial  duties  was  of 
longer  or  shorter  duration,  according  to  his  peculiar  state  at 
the  time ;  and  frequently  he  could  form  an  accurate  judg- 
ment of  the  effect  that  would  be  produced  in  public,  by  the 
languor  or  enlargement  he  had  experienced  in  private.  The 
spirit  of  prayer  accompanied  him  from  the  closet  to  the  pul- 
pit ;  and  while  he  was  virtually  employed  in  pressing  the 
truth  upon  his  hearers,  he  was  inwardly  engaged  in  plead- 
ing that  last  great  promise  of  his  unchangeable  Lord,  ^  I  am 
with  you  always,  even  unto  the  end  of  the  world.'  From 
the  great  congregation  he  again  withdrew  to  his  sacred  re- 
treat, there  requesting  in  secret  that  a  blessing  might  ac- 
company his  public  labors,  and  that  the  seed  which  he  had 
sown,  being  treasured  up  in  honest  and  good  hearts,  might 
sooner  or  later  become  abundantly  fruitful." 

All  good  ministers  of  the  Lord  Jesus  do  thus  seek  the 


154  SECRET    OF    SUCCESS    IN    PREACHING. 

blessing  of  God  before  and  after  their  pulpit  labors.  But 
there  is  a  great  difference  in  the  degree  of  earnestness  and 
fervor  with  which  they  seek,  and  of  course  a  proportionate 
difference  in  the  degree  of  blessing  which  they  gain.  Some 
knock  loudly,  others  faintly  ;  some  strike  once,  twice,  thrice, 
others  seven  times ;  some  wrestle  with  tears,  others  are  com- 
paratively formal.  There  is  no  gift  of  Divine  Grace  more 
precious  to  a  minister  of  Christ  than  a  spirit  of  persevering 
fervency  in  prayer,  no  gift  which  he  ought  to  seek  more 
earnestly  and  to  cultivate  more  assiduously.  Oftentimes, 
perhaps,  when  he  is  laboring  away  upon  his  discourses,  and 
thinks  that  this  and  that  presentation  of  truth  must  be 
effectual,  the  good  effect  upon  his  hearers  is  owing  more  to 
his  prayers  than  his  sermons.  A  minister's  prayers  may  be 
compared  to  the  powder,  by  firing  which  the  cannon-ball  is 
sent  upon  its  errand  ;  without  the  prayers,  his  sermons  will 
be  little  better  than  a  heap  of  cannon-balls  without  powder. 
There  must  be  prayer  from  a  heart  on  fire. 

Some  sermons  are  like  a  bright  artillery -piece  for  a  model : 
all  finished,  burnished,  shining ;  everybody  says;  "  What  a 
splendid  piece  of  ordnance !"  People  stand  and  look  into 
its  mouth,  and  measure  its  breech,  and  lift  the  ball  it  can 
carry,  and  admire  it  without  fear,  for  there  is  no  powder  in 
it.  It  is  not  meant  to  shoot  any  person,  but  to  attract  ad- 
miration as  a  finished  piece  of  ordnance.  An  elaborate 
model-sermon,  without  prayer,  is  a  gun  that  a  man  might 
put  his  ear  to  the  muzzle  of  without  fear.  And  some  ser- 
mons are  like  the  artillery-pieces  that  are  wheeled  into  line 
in  a  sham-fight,  and  fired  with  blank  cartridges.  There 
must  be  both  powder  and  ball,  if  execution  is  to  be  done. 
Above  all  things,  there  must  be  much  prayer.  There  must 
be  prayer  on  fire. 


¥^ 


NATURE  IN  THE  SOUTH  OF  SPAIN 


If  you  will  take  the  map  of  the  world,  and  draw  a  line 
from  north  to  south  at  twenty-four  degrees  twenty-six 
minutes  west  longitude,  and  then  intersect  it  by  a  line 
drawn  from  east  to  west  at  forty-one  degi*ees  and  six  min- 
utes north  latitude,  you  will  probably  find,  at  the  point  of 
intersection,  the  place  of  our  present  existence  on  the  broad 
Atlantic.  You  will  see  that  we  are  not  far  from  the  Azores, 
but  perhaps  twelve  hundred  miles  from  our  desired  haven. 
We  have  learned  that  a  sea-voyage,  with  all  its  lessons 
of  man's  insignificance  and  dependence,  will  not,  of  itself, 
necessarily  draw  the  heart  to  God.  Watchfulness  and 
prayer,  even  amidst  all  the  sublimities  and  dangers  of  the 
ocean,  are  just  as  necessary  as  on  the  land.  It  would  be 
a  season  of  growth  in  grace  unparalleled,  if  a  sea-voyage 
awakened  and  sharpened  the  soul's  hunger! ngs  after  right- 
eousness as  powerfully  as  it  does  the  body's  mortal  appe- 
tites. But  the  heart  must  be  kept  with  all  diligence,  or 
no  external  circumstances  can  keep  it.  Trials  alone  will 
not  soften  it,  blessings  will  not  purify  it,  dangers  will  not 
make  it  cleave  to  God.  Nothing  but  his  own  blessed  Spirit 
can  do  this. 

For  a  season  we  were  in  the  neighborhood  of  one  of  those 
uncertain  rocks  laid  down  in  the  charts  of  the  Atlantic 
Ocean,  which  the  Spaniards  call  vigia^  the  look-out^  which 
few  mariners,  if  any,  have  met  with,  but  with  which  once 
to  meet  might  be  destruction.  Our  captain  endeavored  to 
keep  the  ship  on  a  course  eighteen  or  twenty  miles  at  least 


156 


NATURE    IN    THE    SOUTH    OF    SPAIN. 


to  the  south  of  the  reef,  the  supposed  proximity  of  which 
made  us  a  little  anxious.  After  a  day  or  two,  the  ship,  to 
his  surprise,  notwithstanding  her  southerly  course,  and  the 
very  favorable  winds  we  had  been  experiencing,  had  not 
made  the  southing,  or  progress  southward,  which  he  ex- 
pected, and  it  was  soon  found  that  while  our  course  was 
set  right,  and  the  breezes  seemed  to  aid  us,  a  strong  current, 
of  which  no  one  had  been  aware,  setting  the  other  way, 
defeated  our  calculations,  and  carried  us  almost  exclusively 
eastward.  The  incident  seemed  to  our  minds  a  striking 
symbol  of  the  dangers  encountered  in  the  Christian  conflict, 
and  of  the  frequent  failures  in  a  man's  course  through  life. 
Sometimes,  when  it  seems  to  be  set  right,  and  all  influ- 
ences propitious,  an  undetected  cause  hinders  our  advance- 
ment ;  a  hidden  prejudice,  an  unsuspected  flaw  in  the  char- 
acter, a  sinful  propensity  ungoverned,  a  selfish  plan  secretly 
cherished,  may  turn  the  Christian  from  his  God.  Opposing 
currents  and  concealed  ones,  the  heart's  natural  bias,  par- 
ticular inclinations  and  besetting  sins,  are  to  be  discovered 
and  watched  against.  For  want  of  this,  the  charts  of  Chris- 
tian experience  are  dotted  all  over  with  the  black  marks  of 
sunken  rocks  and  melancholy  shipwrecks. 

At  length  we  are  within  sight  of  land,  and  gliding  along 
with  a  soft  and  pleasant  breeze  on  our  course  to  Gibraltar. 
This  morning,  for  the  first  time,  I  beheld  the  old  world, 
the  world,  whose  very  soil  and  atmosphere  seem  older  than 
our  own,  so  powerful  is  the  etTect  of  their  association  with 
the  ideas  of  ancient  institutions  and  manners,  cities,  towers, 
and  temples,  that  have  stood  the  revolutions  of  a  thousand 
years.  The  land  we  made  was  Cape  St.  Vincent,  with  a 
lofty  convent  rising  on  its  outermost  extremity,  whose 
white  walls  are  the  first  object  that  arrests  the  eye  of  the 
stranger.  Thus  the  first  introduction  of  the  mind  to  the 
knowledge  of  this  country  is  the  hieroglyphic  of  its  history 
for  ages,  and  the  badge  of  its  present  degradation.     Amidst 


NATURE    IN    THE    SOUTH    OF    SPAIN.  157 

the  historical  recollections  that  crowd  upon  the  memory,  I 
can  scarcely  realize  that  I  have  been  all  day  sailing  within 
sight  of  the  coast  of  the  ancient  Lusitania,  the  kingdom 
of  Portugal. 


Another  evening,  and  we  are  still  quietly  moving  to- 
wards Gibraltar.  It  is  now  a  dead  calm,  but  the  current 
sets  through  the  straits  with  such  rapidity,  that  we  are 
moving  on  at  the  rate  of  four  or  five  miles  an  hour.  I 
seem  all  in  a  romance  or  a  dream,  when  I  find  myself  thus 
wafted  onward  with  the  coast  of  Spain  in  full  sight  on  one 
side,  and  the  shores  of  Africa  on  the  other.  In  imagina- 
tion I  have  been  often  here,  but  never  thought  to  see  these 
lands  in  sober  certainty  of  waking  vision.  There  is  no 
moon,  but  the  stars  are  out,  and  the  coast  on  either  side  is 
clearly  visible.  Surely  it  is  a  very  great  mercy  to  have 
been  preserved  from  every  disaster,  and  brought  so  near  to 
our  first  destined  port  in  safety ;  we  are  equally  dependent 
on  an  unseen  God  to  carry  us  securely  though  the  short 
remaining  distance.  Often  do  I  think,  and  with  much 
solemnity,  of  those  beautiful  lines  of  Dante,  beginning — 

"  For  I  have  seen 
The  bark  that  all  the  way  across  the  sea 
Ran  straight  and  speedy,  perish  at  the  last 
Even  in  the  haven's  mouth." 

There  is  more  in  this  than  a  landsman  imagines ;  for  a 
sailor's  perils  thicken  as  he  nears  the  harbor.  An  hour's 
fog  on  the  coast  may  wreck  him,  when  a  week's  storm  at 
sea  would  do  him  no  injury. 


Another  lovely  evening,  and  we  found  ourselves  riding 
peacefully  in  the  romantic  harbor  of  Gibraltar.  Amidst 
external  objects,  I  have  seldom  spent  a  day  of  such  en- 
chantment as  the  first  we  passed  within  the  walls  of  that 
celebrated   fortress.      It  was   almost  a  realization  of  the 


158  NATURE    IN    THE    SOUTH    OF    SPAIN. 

dreams  that  have  captivated  my  childish  imagination  in 
oriental  tales.  Nothing  ever  so  strongly  depicted  before 
me  the  coloring,  or  made  me  breathe  the  atmosphere,  of  the 
Arabian  Nights'  Entertainments.  If  I  had  been  dropped 
from  the  clouds,  or  transported  unknowingly  from  the 
familiar  scenes  at  home  to  those  around  me,  I  could 
scarcely  have  been  more  surprised  and  filled  with  admira- 
tion at  the  contrast.  Such  a  mingling  of  the  sublime, 
beautiful,  and  picturesque,  with  the  grotesque  and  the  lu- 
dicrous, of  the  ordinary  with  the  romantic,  of  strength  in 
art  with  majesty  in  nature,  of  war  and  peace,  of  all  dia- 
lects, figures,  faces,  garbs,  and  religions,  of  lovely  scenery 
with  human  life  and  artificial  manners. 

When  we  arrived  in  the  bay,  the  ship  had  dropped  anchor 
while  we  were  asleep,  and  I  went  upon  deck  during  the 
night,  without  the  least  expectation  of  the  extraordinary 
nature  of  the  scenery  around  me.  The  first  object  that 
arrested  my  sight,  with  a  nearness  and  vividness  really 
startling,  was  the  black,  frowning  mountain,  rising  like  a 
huge  bank  of  cloud  against  the  sky,  with  its  lower  half  all 
illuminated  by  the  lights  in  the  city.  It  seemed  as  if  a 
multitude  of  meteors  or  lanterns  had  been  hung  one  above 
another  against  the  sides  of  the  mountain,  constituting  one 
of  the  most  picturesque  scenes  I  ever  beheld.  Around  me 
rose  a  perfect  amphitheatre  of  hills,  enclosing  the  smooth 
expanse  of  harbor  like  a  lake,  or  mirror  for  the  surround- 
ing panorama.  The  calm  night,  the  bright  stars,  the 
smooth  and  peaceful  water,  the  ships  of  war  riding  around 
us,  the  encircling  shore,  the  distant  mountains,  and  in  the 
front  the  great  Rock  of  Gibraltar,  with  an  illuminated  vil- 
lage hung  upon  its  base,  in  such  nearness,  that  it  seemed 
almost  to  overhang  the  ship,  formed  altogether  a  scene  of 
exciting  interest  for  its  novelty  and  beauty.  Its  power 
was  increased  rather  than  diminished,  when  the  morning 
rose  upon  it,  and  in  the  clear  light,  with  all  the  enchanting 
effect  of  distance  and  shade,  its  hidden  materials,  in  various 


NATURE    IN    THE    SOUTH    OF    SPAIN.  159 

coloring,  came  into  notice  ;  the  rough  grey  summit  of  the 
mountain,  the  Moorish  castle  hanging  half  way  down,  the 
grotesque  looking  buildings,  clustered  in  narrow  terraces 
above  each  other,  as  though  each  terrace  stood  upon  the 
roof  of  the  next  below,  the  fortifications  at  the  base,  the 
vessels  of  every  description  revealed  in  the  harbor,  the 
towns  of  San  Roque  and  Algesiras  in  the  north  and  west, 
and  the  receding  hills  and  mountains  lovely  in  the  sunlight. 


MALAGA  AND  THE  MEDITERRANEAN. 


By  this  time  you  are  all  surrounded  at  home  by  snow- 
drifts half  as  high  as  the  top  of  the  house,  while  we  are  sit- 
ting comfortably  in  January  without  a  fire,  in  the  noon  of  a 
day  as  lovely  as  the  pleasantest  of  our  d  ays  in  Spring.  From 
this  you  may  judge  of  the  climate.  Since  the  rain  the 
weather  is  delightful,  and  the  mountains  around  Malaga 
are  already  putting  on  a  richer  and  more  verdant  coloring. 

It  was  a  clear  and  splendid  afternoon  when  we  weighed 
anchor  in  the  bay  of  Algesiras,  and  bidding  adieu,  for  the 
present,  to  the  sublime  scenery  and  impregnable  fortifica- 
tions of  Gibraltar,  stood  out  into  the  Mediterranean,  on  our 
course  for  Malaga.  The  distance  is  only  sixty  miles,  but 
for  want  of  wind  we  were  a  night  and  a  day  in  accomplish- 
ing it.  It  was  a  delightful  sail,  for  the  sea  was  smooth, 
and  sparkled  beneath  the  beams  of  a  cloudless  sun,  the  air 
was  clear,  and  nothing  could  be  more  lovely  than  the  out- 
line of  the  coast  of  Spain,  as  far  as  the  eye  could  view  it. 
The  distant  mountains  of  Grenada,  covered  with  snow, 
were  always  visible,  and  nearer  to  the  coast,  the  eye  ranged 
among  the  receding  mountains  of  Andalusia,  sprinkled  over 
with  the  white  farm-houses  of  the  peasantry.  The  beauty 
of  the  changing  and  deepening  tints  in  the  sky  and  on  the 
tops  of  the  mountains  at  evening  as  the  sun  goes  down  be- 
hind them  is  extreme.  Though  the  middle  of  December, 
it  was  a  sunset  sky  as  soft  and  beautiful  while  it  lasted,  as 
ours  in  midsummer.    But  at  this  season  the  twilight  passes 


MALAGA  AND  THE  MEDITERRANEAN.         161 

rapidly,  and  the  rich  coloring  of  the  evening  horizon  was 
almost  as  momentary  as  it  was  exquisite  and  changeful. 

There  is  no  great  beauty  in  the  approach  towards  Malaga 
from  the  sea,  except  in  the  grandeur  of  the  Cathedral,  and 
the  lofty  fortress  of  the  Gibral-Faro.  These  noble  piles  of 
Spanish  and  Moorish  architecture  are  distinguishable  at  a 
great  distance,  towering  far  above  the  whole  city,  and 
placed  in  bold  relief  against  the  brown  declivities  of  the 
mountains  in  the  back  ground.  From  the  interior  the  ap- 
proach to  the  city  and  the  Mediterranean  is  very  lovely, 
for  you  descend  from  the  very  summits  of  the  mountains 
that  sweep  down  upon  the  luxuriant  vega  or  plain  in  which 
Malaga  is  so  beautifully  situated,  winding  gradually  down- 
wards into  its  bosom,  varying  your  view  every  moment, 
with  the  plain,  the  city,  and  the  sea  all  before  you.  As 
to  the  architecture  of  the  city,  except  its  splendid  Cathedral, 
and  some  few  Moorish  remains,  interesting  to  an  antiquary, 
it  has  nothing.  Neither  do  the  fine  arts  flourish,  nor  litera- 
ture, nor  religion ;  nothing  but  grapes,  almonds,  raisins, 
wheat,  wine,  and  oil.  There  are  all  things  in  this  delicious 
region  to  gladden  man's  heart,  to  strengthen  his  bones,  and 
to  make  his  face  to  shine  ;  but  for  his  mind  and  his  spiritual 
being,  nothing. 

Out  of  doors  the  air  is  full  of  pictures.  Come  with  me, 
and  we  will  take  a  very  early  stroll  through  the  city,  to 
see  its  life,  on  a  morning  as  balmy  and  delightful  in  the 
middle  of  January  as  the  sweet  days  in  the  pleasantest  part 
of  a  New  England  Spring.  We  are  now  close  by  the 
Cathedral,  and  in  the  interior  of  the  city. 

Directing  our  steps  first  towards  the  mole,  we  emerge 
suddenly  from  the  narrow  street  to  a  view  of  the  whole 
harbor,  with  its  variety  of  shipping  and  multitude  of  hghters 
and  small  boats  commencing  the  day's  activity,  and  shining 
brightly  in  the  sunrise.  Off  the  harbor,  a  very  large  ship, 
apparently  a  man  of  war,  may  be  seen  through  the  glass, 
standing  across  the  bay,  perhaps  to  gain  an  entrance.    Sea- 


162  MALAGA  AND  THE  MEDITERRANEAN. 

ward,  everything  looks  full  of  life  and  animation,  bright 
waves  curling  in  the  breeze,  and  white  sails  in  the  distant 
horizon  glancing  to  the  sun.  Through  scattered  groups  of 
peasants  and  boatmen  gathering  to  their  day's  labors,  we 
pass  along  the  mole,  till  our  attention  is  arrested  by  a  gang 
of  presida?'ios,  or  prisoners,  chained,  ragged  and  wretched 
in  their  appearance,  stupid,  sensual  and  ferocious,  seated  on 
the  wall  by  the  road  side,  and  eating  their  breakfast  of 
black  bread,  as  though  there  were  nothing  else  in  the  world 
worthy  of  notice. 

From  the  mole  we  enter  upon  the  Alameda,  and  cross- 
ing its  smooth  and  at  this  hour  nearly  solitary  walks,  strike 
into  the  busy  hive  in  the  main  market  place  of  the  city. 
This  consists  of  an  open  square,  from  which  several  streets 
diverge,  and  in  every  part  of  which,  as  in  the  narrow  stalls 
around  it,  the  peasants  expose  their  produce  and  eatables. 
The  variety  and  luxuriant  abundance  of  green  vegetables 
and  salads  in  mid- winter  will  arrest  your  notice.  Some- 
'times  you  see  them  arranged  in  the  central  part  of  the 
square,  in  the  form  of  a  hollow  parallelogram,  within 
which  groups  of  peasants  are  loitering,  with  their  mules 
just  unladed,  while  crowds  of  household  servants,  both 
men  and  women,  and  here  and  there  a  master  of  the  house, 
are  gathering  the  day's  supply  of  provisions,  which  they 
put  into  open  grass  baskets  or  bags,  and  carry  home  upon 
their  shoulders.  Men,  women  and  children  stand  at  their 
piles  of  vegetable  merchandise,  or  in  the  mouths  of  their 
little  stalls,  and  attract  your  attention  by  the  vivacity  of 
their  cries,  if  not  by  the  novelty  of  their  articles.  The 
abundance  of  ripe,  red  tomatoes  is  a  rich  spectacle,  piled 
up  in  lofty  pyramids,  and  flanked  perhaps  by  the  long, 
grey  scolloped  leaves  and  white  roots  of  the  Spanish  arti- 
choke,  or  luxuriant  heaps  of  green  and  tender  lettuces. 
Green  peas  are  a  customary  article  at  all  seasons.  Bas- 
kets of  green  cresses,  and  bunches  of  white  cauliflower, 
turnips  and  radishes,  parsley  and  spinnage,  with  heaps  of 


MALAGA  AND  THE  MEDITERRANEAN.         163 

enormous  onions,  piles  of  long  red  potatoes,  stacks  of  sugar 
cane,  and  immense  quantities  of  oranges  and  lemons,  both 
sweet  and  sour,  cover  the  ground  in  every  direction. 

A  street  leading  from  one  corner  of  the  square  is  occu- 
pied as  a  bread-market,  and  makes  a  very  rich  display, 
considering  the  simplicity  of  its  materials.  At  this  hour 
it  is  crowded  with  borricos  just  in  from  the  country,  with 
their  panniers  filled  with  loaves  of  the  nicest  bread,  white 
and  brown,  the  owners  busy  in  disposing  of  their  loads  to 
customers.  In  one  end  of  this  street  you  see  a  row  of 
matrons,  seated  by  the  house-wall,  with  variously  formed 
loaves  of  brown  bread,  spread  out  in  baskets  or  mats  upon 
the  pavement  before  them,  and  chattering  with  one  another 
and  the  peasantry  with  a  merry  glee,  inspired  by  the 
morning  air,  the  busy  scene,  the  hope  of  good  gain,  and 
the  plenty  before  them.  The  sight  indeed  is  enough  to 
renew  the  appetite  of  childhood,  and  make  even  the  con- 
firmed dyspeptic  forget  his  cares.  The  diet-lecturers  and 
bran-bread  consumers  in  our  country  would  dance  for  glee 
at  the  spectacle ;  for  in  truth  the  brown  bread  of  the  prov- 
ince of  Andalusia  is  some  of  the  lightest,  sweetest,  and 
most  wholesome  in  the  world.  The  white  bread  is  equally 
excellent  in  its  kind.  It  is  baked  in  circular  rolls,  shaped 
like  a  diamond  ring,  or  in  square  loaves,  w^hich  are  sold 
for  eight  or  ten  cents,  the  brown  loaves  being  considerably 
cheaper.  One  reason  for  the  constant  excellence  of  the 
bread  in  Spain  is  because  it  is  thoroughly  kneaded  and 
equably  and  thoroughly  baked.  It  is  brought  into  the  city 
in  open  panniers  in  the  clear  morning  air,  instead  of  being 
shut  up  smoking  from  the  oven,  to  perspire  in  the  bakers' 
carts.  Sometimes  the  whole  quantity  brought  in  of  a 
morning  is  condemned  and  given  to  the  poor,  simply  be- 
cause the  loaves  are  found  deficient  in  weight. 

In  Grenada  I  have  seen  a  kind  of  bread  exposed  for 
sale,  made  of  the  garabanzos  or  Spanish  beans,  of  a  golden 
yellow  color,  but  not  very  pleasant  to  the  taste,  though 


164         MALAGA  AND  THE  MEDITERRANEAN. 

doubtless  nutritious  in  its  quality.  If  sour  bread  be 
rightly  put  down  among  the  sources  of  domestic  discontent, 
perhaps  the  cheerfulness  of  the  Spanish  peasantry  may  be 
attributed  partly  to  the  sweetness  of  their  brown  loaves ; 
at  all  events,  with  such  bread,  and  a  plenty  of  olive  oil, 
and  the  common  fruits  and  vegetables  of  the  country,  they 
may  live  perhaps  better  than  the  peasantry  of  any  other 
country  in  Europe.  A  very  common  and  favorite  dish 
called  migas  is  composed  entirely  of  bread  crumbled  very 
fine  into  a  frying-pan  with  oil  and  salt,  the  crumbling  and 
stirring  continued  over  the  fire  till  the  mass  is  sufficient  in 
quantity,  and  rendered  savory  with  the  seasoning.  The 
sweetness  of  the  bread  is  preserved,  and  the  dish  appears 
upon  the  tdble  a  pile  of  light  crumbs,  a  little  moistened 
with  the  oil,  and  a  little  embrowned  in  the  operation  of 
frying ;  nor  could  any  man  of  simple  appetite  desire  a  more 
wholesome  and  relishing-  breakfast.  In  the  country  they 
cook  it  in  immense  quantities,  adding  to  it  shreds  of  meat, 
garlic,  and  red  pepper,  and  composing  a  dish  as  familiar  to 
a  Spanish  peasant,  as  an  oriental  pilau  to  the  natives  of 
the  East. 

I  am  afraid  of  saying  too  much  upon  a  business  so  gross 
as  that  of  eating.  Si  tibi  deficiant  medici^  says  an  old 
dietetical  adage. 

Si  tibi  deficiant  medici.  medici  tibi  fiant 

Haec  tria ;  mens  hilaris,  requies,  moderata  dioeta. 

If  you  ivant  physicians,  take  these  three :  quiet,  a 
cheerful  mind,  and  spare  diet.  Milton  may  paraphrase 
this  pleasant  maxim  in  the  Penseroso,  adding  another  line 
on  the  pleasure  of  rural  exercise — 

And  join  with  thee  calm  Peace  and  Quiet, 
Spare  Fast,  that  oft  with  gods  doth  diet : 
And  add  to  these  retired  Leisure, 
That  in  trim  gardens  takes  his  pleasure. 

Intemperance  is  by  no  means  confined  to  the  drinking  of 


MALAGA  AND  THE  MEDITERRANEAN.  165 

ardent  spirits.  There  are  multitudes,  who  becloud  the 
mind,  and  render  the  soul's  upward  aspirations  difficult, 
if  not  impossible,  by  the  indulgence  of  an  appetite,  which 
they  never  dream  of  being  inordinate,  but  continue  to 
cherish  as  an  indication  of  hearty  health.  If  a  man  may 
be  a  drunkard  upon  wine,  so  may  he  be  a  glutton  upon 
vegetables.  "Our  elegant  eaters,"  says  Cicero,  in  one  of 
his  letters,  "  in  order  to  bring  vegetables  into  fashion,  have 
found  out  a  method  of  dressing  them  in  so  high  a  taste, 
that  nothing  can  be  more  palatable.  It  was  immediately 
after  having  eaten  very  freely  of  a  dish  of  this  sort,  at  the 
inauguration  feast  of  Lentulus,  that  I  was  attacked  with  a 
disorder  which  has  never  ceased  till  this  day.  Thus  you 
see  that  I,  who  have  withstood  all  the  temptations  that  the 
noblest  lamprejs  and  oysters  could  throw  in  my  way,  have 
at  last  been  overpowered  by  paltry  beets  and  mallows.*' 
If  all  the  philosophy  of  Cicero  could  not  save  him  from 
being  overcome  in  this  manner,  perhaps  even  the  Graham 
bread  may  not  always  preserve  its  disciples  from  tempt- 
ation. 

From  one  side  of  the  vegetable-market  we  pass  a  short 
distance  into  the  Alhondiga,  or  grain-market,  a  large  pile 
of  buildings  formerly  connected  with  the  great  Moorish 
naval  arsenal,  and  used  as  a  mosque,  but  afterwards  con- 
verted into  a  convent  by  the  Catholics,  and  now  turned  to 
the  more  useful  purposes  of  a  deposit  for  wheat.  It  con- 
tains storehouses  and  arched  stalls,  with  a  broad  open  court 
in  the  midst,  where  the  grain  lies  before  you  in  heaps  and 
sacks,  just  brought  from  the  country  by  groups  of  peasants, 
who  are  bargaining  for  its  disposal.  The  wheat  of  Malaga 
is  one  of  the  most  important  and  excellent  productions  of 
this  region  ;  the  kingdom  of  Andalusia  producing  so  great 
a  quantity  that  it  has  been  called  the  granary  of  Spain. 
Rain  or  no  rain,  says  the  proverb,  there  is  wheat  in  Anda- 
lusia. Its  superior  excellence  is  one  cause  of  the  superiority 
of  the  bread.     Its  price  in  Malaga  is  from  46  to  52  reals  a 


166 


MALAGA    AND    THE    MEDITERRANEAN. 


fanega,  or,  upon  an  average,  one  dollar  a  bushel,  the 
Spanish  fanega  containing  a  little  over  a  bushel  and  a  half 
of  English  measure.  If  this  delightful  province  were  a 
state  within  the  limits  of  New  England,  fertile  as  is  its 
soil,  and  abundant  as  are  its  productions,  there  would  be  a 
scarcity  of  bread-stuffs,  through  the  remorseless  consump- 
tion of  the  distilleries.  I  know  not  what  would  become  of 
the  multitude  of  the  poor  in  this  country,  if  those  scourges 
of  the  world  were  as  common  here  as  they  are  with  us. 
There  are  but  few  of  them,  and  the  people  are  unquestion- 
ably a  temperate,  and  so  far  a  happy  and  a  healthy  race. 
What  an  anomaly  does  it  present  when  the  United  States 
are  compelled  to  send  into  Europe  for  a  supply  of  bread  ! 
And  what  a  pernicious  example  of  political  economy,  when 
the  legislatures  of  those  States  are  seen  legalizing  the  manu- 
facture and  sale  of  ardent  spirits,  and  thus  absolutely  turn- 
ing the  agricultural  industry  of  the  country  into  its  bane, 
and  the  source  of  its  life  and  health  into  a  poison  I  House- 
less children  are  crying  for  food,  while  the  distilleries  are 
wasting  it,  and  the  arm  of  the  law  is  stretched  forth  to  pro- 
tect a  trade  that  manufactures  out  of  its  waste  and  con- 
sumption, the  materials  to  convert  its  homes  into  earthly 
hells,  and  their  parents  and  natural  protectors  into  brutes. 

Passing  through  one  of  the  arches  of  the  Alhondiga,  we 
emerge  into  a  street,  on  one  side  of  which  the  inmates  of 
the  houses  are  busy  frying  fish  upon  open  furnaces  before 
their  doors,  and  selling  them  to  the  passers  by.  A  little 
urchin  with  one  hand  full  of  figs  is  bargaining  with  the 
mistress  of  one  of  these  furnaces  for  a  few  buccaronies  to 
complete  his  breakfast.  Ihese  are  a  curious  little  fish, 
somewhat  larger  than  "  the  triton  of  the  minnows"  in  a 
fresh-water  river,  and  are  produced  in  such  immense  quan- 
tities in  the  bay  of  Malaga,  as  almost  to  constitute  the 
riches  of  the  fishermen  and  the  living  of  the  poor.  They 
are  very  delicious  and  very  cheap,  so  that  they  are  con- 


MALAGA  AND  THE  MEDITERRANEAN.  167 

sidered  quite  a  peculiar  gift  of  Providence  to  this  region. 
Great  quantities  of  them  are  made  into  anchovies. 

Around  these  various  market-streets  the  crowd  we  meet 
is  of  the  most  motley  character,  men,  v^^omen,  and  children, 
grey-haired  and  vi^ithered  hags,  that  might  have  been  the 
prototypes  of  Shakspeare's  witches,  some  with  strings  of 
braided  garlic,  others  with  hats,  shoes,  and  old  clothes, 
others  with  rusty  firelocks,  or  boxes  of  jewellery,  others 
again  with  roasted  chestnuts  or  baskets  of  fruit,  anything 
that  will  tempt  the  motley  multitude,  and  gain  an  ochavo 
in  the  bargain.  Carriers  of  sweetmeats  struggle  through 
the  crowd,  others  with  earthen  jars  of  water,  others  with 
a  tin  canister  of  hot  coffee,  and  a  basket  of  cups  to  drink  it 
withal.  The  scene  is  as  ragged  a  medley  as  can  well  be 
met  with.  In  the  dusk  of  the  evening,  when  the  lamps 
are  lighted,  its  irregularity  and  wildness  make  it  still  more 
striking. 

From  the  market  squares  we  will  pass  in  our  way  home- 
wards through  one  of  the  main  streets  near  the  Guadal 
Medina,  occupied  partly  by  mechanics,  some  of  whom  are 
out  before  the  doors  of  their  cells,  with  their  benches  in 
the  open  air.  Here  is  a  man  with  an  iron  roller,  bending 
sheets  of  thin  wood  for  the  manufacturer  of  sieves,  which 
you  see  inside  his  shop,  lining  the  walls,  in  every  stage  of 
their  progress.  Close  by  his  side,  a  woman,  with  her  fur- 
nace on  the  doorsteps  and  a  flat  wooden  spoon  in  her  hand, 
is  frying  pancakes,  or  bunuelos,  as  they  are  called,  for  the 
palates  of  such  as  may  choose.  The  trade  of  the  bunuele- 
ras,  or  women  who  fry  and  sell  these  cakes,  is  quite  a 
source  of  profit  at  the  corners  of  frequented  streets.  A 
little  onward,  and  we  pass  several  shops  of  bottle-makers, 
or  manufacturers  of  wine-bags,  a  singular  spectacle  to  the 
eye  of  a  stranger,  the  walls  hung  round  in  every  direction 
with  half- tanned  inflated  hogskins  and  goatskins,  black, 
brown,  and  gray.  The  skin  is  taken  entire  from  the  ani- 
mal, and,  turned  inside  out,  constitutes  the  bottle  or  bag, 


168 


MALAGA    AND    THE    MEDITERRANEAN. 


the  hairy  side  being  covered  with  a  coating  of  pitch. 
Drinking  vessels  with  wooden  rims  in  the  form  of  shot- 
pouches  are  manufactured  from  the  same  materials ;  and 
you  may  often  see  the  peasants,  with  their  mules  laden 
with  bags  of  wine,  stopping  to  drink  of  their  contents  out 
of  these  rustic  cups.  All  the  wine  brought  in  from  the 
country  is  thus  transported  in  skins  on  the  backs  of  mules, 
and  is  sold  generally  not  by  measure  but  weight.  The 
same  is  the  case  with  the  olive  oil ;  but  the  bottles  or  bags 
for  oil,  instead  of  being  coated  with  pitch,  are  tanned  on 
both  sides.  In  the  district  of  Malaga  alone  there  are  more 
than  five  hundred  oil  presses. 

At  the  head  of  this  street  a  water  fountain  plays  perpet- 
ually, surrounded  at  this  hour  with  a  number  of  peasants, 
who  are  filling  their  jars  with  water  by  means  of  a  long 
reed  connected  with  the  neck  of  the  jar,  and  applied  to 
the  mouth  of  the  fountain.  Turning  into  another  street, 
we  meet  a  company  of  the  same  chained  and  haggard 
presidarios,  whom  we  saw  on  the  wall  of  the  mole,  their 
leader  enveloped  in  a  ragged  capa^  thrown  over  his  shoul- 
ders with  all  the  dignity  of  a  Spanish  grandee.  They  are 
employed  in  tying  up  immense  heaps  of  black  bread,  lying 
before  them  on  the  pavement  by  the  baker's  door ;  they 
raise  it  on  their  shoulders,  and  then  file  off  in  regular  order 
towards  their  prison  on  the  quay.  The  bread  is  the  food 
of  the  prisoners,  coarse,  but  sweet  and  wholesome. 

It  is  now  the  hour  of  mass  in  the  churches.  Entering 
the  Sagrario,  or  parish  church  of  the  Cathedral,  you  see 
here  and  there  a  solitary  worshipper,  kneeling  towards  the 
altar,  before  which  two  or  three  priests,  clad  in  their  service- 
robes,  are  monotonously  running  over  their  superstitious 
ceremonies.  A  single  female  is  kneeling  at  one  of  the 
confessional  boxes,  within  which  sits  a  portly  padre,  his 
ear  bent  attentively  towards  the  netted  window  of  the  box, 
where  the  lips  of  the  penitent  are  pouring  forth  the  avowal 
of  her  sins.     To  God,  to  the  saints,  and  to  the  priests,  she 


169 

makes  the  confession,  and  supplicates  the  latter  to  pray  to 
saints  and  angels  for  the  pardon  of  her  soul.  Her  con- 
science is  left  with  her  confessor,  and  that  within  her 
bosom  is  almost  seared  and  paralyzed  by  the  habits  of  her 
religion.  And  the  conclusion  forced  upon  the  mind  by  an 
attentive  observance  of  the  forms  and  influences  of  Popery 
in  a  Roman  Catholic  state,  can  be  no  other  than  this,  that 
at  best  it  is  a  religion  which  leaves  the  whole  multitude  of 
its  followers  without  God  in  the  world.  May  the  God  of 
all  grace  have  mercy  upon  this  unhappy  kingdom,  and 
may  the  Faith  of  Christ  speedily  be  established  over  the 
ruins  of  the  Empire  of  the  Man  of  Sin. 


MILTON'S    CORRESPONDENCE. 

What  would  not  the  world  give  for  a  collection  of 
Milton's  Private  Correspondence !  The  only  letters  that 
we  have  of  his  are  letters  of  State,  grand  letters,  letters 
written  with  the  wide  eye  of  the  world  over  the  shoulder 
of  the  writer.  But  of  epistolary  correspondence,  of  that 
which  is  a  careless  hasty  record  of  a  man's  familiar  thoughts 
and  feelings,  as  they  come  and  go  in  the  current  of  every 
day's  existence,  we  have  nothing. 

"  Thy  soul  was  like  a  star,  and  dwelt  apart ; 
Thou  hadst  a  voice,  whose  sound  was  like  the  sea; 
Pure  as  the  naked  heavens,  majestic,  free ; 
So  didst  thou  travel  on  life's  common  way." 

We  hear  the  roar  of  the  sea ;  the  voice  in  English  liter- 
ature is  as  that  of  Niagara  among  waters.  We  behold, 
too,  the  perpetual  shining  of  the  star,  but  there  is  a  sense 
of  apartness,  a  majesty  of  loneliness  about  it.  The  roar 
of  the  ocean  is  grand,  but  it  is  pleasant  sometimes  to  hear 
the  gurgle  of  the  running  brooks  among  forest  leaves,  when 
"  inland  far  we  be."  And  such  a  music  is  in  the  minor 
poems  of  Milton,  but  we  have  no  familiar  letters. 

8 


FEBRUARY  IN  THE  SOUTH  OF  SPAIN. 


I  CAN  scarcely  imagine  a  more  lovely  day  than  this — 
the  atmosphere  clear,  sweet,  and  mild,  the  sky  bright  and 
glorious,  with  no  cloud  to  be  seen,  save  here  and  there  a 
white  thread  casting  a  speck  of  shadow  on  the  sides  of  the 
distant  declivities,  and  a  robe  of  fleecy  silver  resting  on  the 
summits  of  the  Western  Sierra.  The  sun  is  shining  with 
the  power  of  summer  in  New  England,  and  the  west  wind 
plays  across  one's  temples  with  the  refreshing  coolness  of  a 
breeze  in  May.     It  seemed  a  day, 

"  able  to  drive 
All  sadness  but  despair." 

The  Mediterranean  enjoys  its  influences  like  a  living  intel- 
ligence, and  reciprocates  them  into  the  atmosphere,  steal- 
ing and  giving  beauty.  Its  waves  play  softly  in  the  sun- 
light, and  slowly  and  indolently  swell  and  break  upon  the 
beach,  with  a  musical  liquid  gurgle,  most  refreshing  and 
delightful.  A  ride  along  the  seaside  towards  Velez-Malaga 
such  a  morning  as  this,  quickens  all  the  animal  spirits  to 
an  exhilarating  sense  of  the  happiness  of  existence  in  such  a 
world  of  beauty.  The  song  of  the  fishermen,  and  every 
movement  of  man,  woman,  and  child,  as  they  draw  their 
nets  to  the  shore,  and  are  busy  on  its  margin,  seem  tinged 
with  the  romantic  coloring  of  its  climate.  The  peasants, 
as  you  meet  them,  seem  as  if  they  breathed  contentment 
from  its  loveliness.  All  the  joyous  influences  of  sea,  and 
ftir.  and   sun^Jift.  dron   like  the  falling   dew  upon   the 


FEBRUARY    IN    THE    SOUTH    OF    SPAIN.  171 

animal  system,  stealing  over  every  nerve,  and  raising  it 
with  the  most  pure  and  healthful  excitement.  It  is  happi- 
ness to  be ;  and  a  man  feels  as  if  he  could  dance  like  a 
little  child,  from  the  mere  instinctive  impulse  of  delight. 

So  sweet  and  enlivening  are  all  the  influences  of  man^s 
earthly  habitation  upon  his  mortal  frame,  if  he  bears  about' 
a  mind  at  peace  with  God.  If  the  body  be  undiseased  by 
sickness,  or  pleased  and  soothed  with  the  grateful  sensations 
of  returning  health,  at  such  a  season  as  this  the  mind  is 
powerfully  awakened  to  a  sense  of  the  goodness  of  God, 
and  a  delight  in  the  feeling  of  his  Omnipresence.  The 
face  of  nature,  in  such  an  hour  of  uninterrupted,  universal 
beauty  and  harmony,  is  to  the  soul  a  sweet  image,  though 
infinitely  inadequate,  of  the  Divine  Loveliness.  It  leads, 
or  certainly  it  ought  to  lead,  the  heart  directly  up  to 
Heaven. 

"  If  such  the  sweetness  of  the  streams, 
What  must  the  fountain  be  ! 
Where  saints  and  angels  draw  their  bliss 
Immediately  from  Thee  !" 

It  were  well  if  the  mind  could  retain  that  habit  of  holy 
meditation,  which  such  a  scene  begins  to  lead  it  into,  and 
the  heart  that  glow  of  gratitude,  and  that  lively,  quick 
perception  of  mercy,  when  the  individual  returns  from  the 
open  contemplation  of  the  Divine  works  into  the  world  of 
human  society.  But  how  readily,  amidst  human  dwellings 
and  worldly  employments,  does  the  heart  wander  away 
both  from  nature  and  from  God  ! 

The  fragrance  of  a  field  of  sweet  peas  in  blossom  was 
delicious  as  I  passed  it — redolent  of  all  images  of  vernal 
delight.  Indeed,  the  winter  in  this  region  was  over  some 
weeks  ago,  and  here,  in  the  middle  of  February,  the  season 
when  the  cold  is  at  its  height  of  power  in  New  England, 
an  American  experiences  the  climate  of  summer.  A  week 
or  two  since,  the  almond  trees  were  all  in  blossom,  and  a 
novel  and  very  beautiful  scene  it  was.    I  cannot  but  esteem 


172  FEBRUARY    IN    THE    SOUTH    OF    SPAIN. 

the  climate  of  Malaga  as  one  of  the  finest  in  the  world. 
It  is  doubtless  the  sweetest  in  all  the  region  of  the  south 
of  Spain,  and  that  is  considered  superior  to  the  climate  of 
any  other  country  on  the  Mediterranean,  except,  perhaps, 
a  part  of  the  south  of  Italy.  A  fortnight  of  cold  weather 
and  a  fortnight  of  rain  may  be  said  to  constitute  the  winter, 
and  even  that  is  of  so  mild  a  character,  that  we  could 
scarcely  compare  it,  without  injustice,  to  any  period  be- 
tween the  months  of  November  and  April  in  our  own 
country.  The  air  is  dry  and  pure,  the  sky  serene,  the 
changes  neither  sudden  nor  difficult  to  be  borne.  The 
penetrating  wind  that  is  experienced  sometimes  in  Decem- 
ber, after  a  long  succession  of  dry  weather,  is  trying  while 
it  lasts,  and  brings  with  it  something  like  a  catarrhal  epi- 
demic ;  but  in  general,  the  year  round,  the  weather  is 
equable  and  the  climate  salubrious.  It  combines,  in  truth, 
the  purity  and  sparkling  clearness  of  a  mountain  atmos- 
phere, with  the  refreshing  wholesomeness  of  the  sea-breezes. 
In  the  winter  the  surrounding  hemisphere  of  mountains 
serves  as  a  barrier  against  the  sweeping  north  winds,  and 
in  the  summer  the  heat  of  the  land  breezes  is  tempered  and 
moistened  by  the  air  from  the  sea.  Sudden  changes  of  the 
weather,  so  tr3dng  to  the  constitution  in  our  northern  zone, 
are  strangers  to  this  climate,  and  so  are  the  damps  and 
fogs,  and  hanging,  leaden  drapery  of  clouds,  that  affect 
equally  the  mind  and  the  body  of  an  invalid,  depressing  the 
spirits  in  depriving  the  nerves  of  their  elasticity. 

The  evening  air  is  almost  as  wholesome  as  that  of  the 
day,  and  the  early  morning  is  extremely  pure  and  delicious. 
It  is  not  possible  to  describe  the  beauty  of  the  sunset  after 
a  clear  day,  and  a  soft  west  wind  have  thrown  their  influ- 
ences into  the  atmosphere.  The  extremity  of  the  Mole  by 
the  Linterna,  or  light-house,  is  an  admirable  point  of  ob- 
servation, and  a  walk  thither  in  the  cool  of  the  morning,  or 
the  glow  of  the  setting  sun,  is  very  delightful.  You  are 
almost  out  at  sea,  and  surrounded  by  the  blue  depths  of  the 


FEBRUARY    IN    THE    SOUTH    OF    SPAIN.  173 

Mediterranean  on  either  side.  You  command  a  front  view 
of  the  city,  and  the  range  of  mountains  in  the  west,  behind 
which  the  sun  is  slowly  sinking.  As  he  levels  his  depart- 
ing rays  across  the  wide  plain,  and  over  the  city,  against 
the  spire  of  the  Cathedral,  and  the  battlements  of  the  Gib- 
ral-Faro,  and  over  the  harbor,  the  shipping  and  the  mole,  it 
is  a  scene  of  surpassing  loveliness.  The  vast  plain  between 
the  city  and  the  mountains  is  covered  with  a  cloud  or  haze 
of  light,  out  of  which  the  range  of  mountains  rises,  with 
their  base  colored  with  the  deepest  indigo,  while  their  sum- 
mits are  bathed  in  the  golden  blaze,  which  the  sun  pours 
over  all  the  western  horizon.  The  twilight  tints  are  beau- 
tifully rich  and  strange,  changing  continually  ;  and  the 
extent  of  horizon  from  which  the  shafts  of  crimson  and 
golden  light,  or  bundles  of  arrowy  rays  in  quivers,  shoot  up 
athwart  the  sky  from  the  departing  sun,  includes  almost 
the  whole  western  hemisphere.  The  effect  upon  the  outline 
of  the  sea  is  very  rich.  As  the  sun  is  setting,  even  the 
distant  coast  of  Africa  sometimes  becomes  distinctly  visi- 
ble, and  the  ships,  at  the  outermost  line  of  the  sea  and 
sky,  hang  themselves  like  little  sailing  clouds,  in  the  at- 
mosphere. 

The  surprising  clearness  of  the  atmosphere  brings  distant 
objects  near,  and  minutely  distinct,  and  the  intensity  of  the 
coloring,  and  yet  the  mellowness  of  every  hue  is  as  if  heaven 
and  earth  were  steeped  in  crimson.  All  this  towards  the 
west.  On  the  other  side  the  moon  is  silently  commencing 
her  reign,  with  two  fair  stars  just  below  her ;  and  the  coast, 
as  it  stretches  away  to  the  east,  is  lost  from  the  eye  in  the 
dimness  of  evening.  The  Moorish  mountain  begins  to  look 
wild  and  supernatural  as  the  shades  gather  around  it,  and 
towards  that  side  the  face  almost  gathers  blackness,  while 
towards  the  west  you  seem  as  if  fronting  the  splendors  of 
eternity. 

I  am  reminded  in  some  respects  so  powerfully  of  Byron's 
description  in  the  fourth  canto  of  Childe  Harold,  and  it  is 


174  FEBRUARY    IN    THE    SOUTH    OF    SPAIN. 

in  itself  a  description  so  true  of  the  sunset  as  I  now  witness 
itj  (though  written  in  Italy,)  that  I  cannot  but  quote  a  part 
of  his  stanzas. 

The  moon  is  up,  and  yet  it  is  not  night. 
Sunset  divides  the  sky  with  her — a  sea 
Of  glory  streams  along  the  Alpine  height 
Of  blue  Friuli's  mountains ;  heaven  is  free 
From  clouds,  but  of  all  colors  seems  to  be 
Melted  to  one  vast  iris  of  the  west, 
Where  the  day  joins  the  past  eternity  ; 
While,  on  the  other  hand,  meek  Dian's  crest 
Floats  through  the  azure  air,  an  island  of  the  blest. 

A  single  star  is  at  her  side,  and  reigns 

With  her  o'er  half  the  lovely  heavens ;  but  still 

Yon  sunny  sea  heaves  brightly. 

Filled  with  the  face  of  heaven,  which  from  afar 

Comes  down  upon  the  waters ;  all  its  hues, 

From  the  rich  sunset  to  the  rising  star, 

Their  magical  variety  diffuse  ; 

And  now  they  change ;  a  paler  shadow  strews 

Its  mantle  o'er  the  mountains  ;  parting  day 

Dies  like  the  dolphin,  whom  each  pang  imbues 

With  a  new  color  as  it  gasps  away, 

The  last  still  loveliest,  till  't  is  gone — and  all  is  gray. 

Combined  with  the  beauty  of  this  scene,  you  have,  in 
returning  from  your  walk,  the  picturesque  cluster  of  ships 
in  the  harbor,  with  all  the  animating  sights  and  sounds  of 
the  port — ^the  ships,  galleys,  feluccas,  and  vessels  of  all  na- 
tions, the  sounds  of  the  hammer,  the  odor  of  the  tar,  the 
evening  hum  of  the  mariners,  the  sweep  of  the  oars,  as  the 
boats  pass  and  re-pass  between  the  quay  and  the  shipping. 
The  genius  of  Crabbe  would  find  admirable  subjects  for  his 
graphic  pencil.  If  you  are  fond  of  the  ocean,  you  may  en- 
joy it  here  in  all  its  aspects.  In  this  respect  Malaga  is 
different  from  most  cities,  for  the  sea  rolls  in  at  its  founda- 
tions, and  a  few  steps  will  take  you  to  the  beach,  or  give 
you  the  view  of  the  whole  harbor,  with  all  its  animating 
movements. 


LOOKING  UP  THERE,  AND  DOWN  HERE. 


The  celebrated  Matthew  Wilkes  was  once  in  company 
with  a  young  clergyman  who  was  appointed  to  preach  in 
the  chapel  formerly  occupied  by  Whitefield.  Having  to 
look  into  the  Bible  in  the  pulpit  for  some  purpose  connected 
with  the  services  before  the  congregation  were  assembled, 
Mr.  Wilkes  discovered  the  young  minister's  notes  between 
the  leaves.  "  What !  (said  he)  notes,  where  Whitefield 
preached  ?  What !  are  you  going  to  read  a  sermon  from 
Whitefield's  pulpit  ?"  ''  Ah  !  (said  the  minister)  the  place 
is  large,  and  is  a  new  one  for  me,  and  I  tremble  at  the 
thought  of  coming  to  the  people  without  some  written  prep- 
aration." "  Ah,  well,  well,"  said  Mr  Wilkes,  "  it  may  be 
so  ;  but  remember,  (and  here  he  looked  up  to  heaven,  at 
the  same  time  laying  his  hand  upon  the  manuscript  sermon 
on  the  desk)  remember,  the  more  you  look  up  there,  the 
less  you'll  find  it  necessary  to  look  down  here." 

This  was  very  striking.  There  is  a  great  deal  of  heav- 
enly meaning  contained  in  this  sentence  of  Mr  Wilkes. 
There  is  a  great  deal  of  instruction  for  every  minister. 
"  The  more  you  look  up  there^  the  less  you  will  have  to  look 
down  hereP  The  more  you  look  to  God,  the  less  will  be 
your  dependence  on  yourself,  and  on  man.  The  more  you 
look  to  God,  the  more  independent  you  will  be  of  yourself 
and  of  man.  The  more  superior  you  will  be  to  the  fear  of 
man,  which  bringeth  a  snare,  and  the  more  powerful  you 
will  be  in  yourself,  by  the  grace  of  God  within  you.     Look 


176  LOOKING    UP    THERE,    AND    DOWN    HERE. 

aloft !  It  is  the  only  way  to  get  safely  down.  Look  aloft ! 
"Whether  you  have  notes  before  you,  or  thoughts  within 
you,  or  both,  it  is  the  only  way  to  make  them  available, 
the  only  way  to  give  them  power  over  your  hearers,  the 
only  way  to  speak  them  as  from  God,  the  only  way  to 
preach  with  comfort  and  happiness  to  yourself,  with  power 
and  benefit  to  your  hearers.  Look  up  to  God  !  It  is  the 
only  way  to  make  your  hearers  look  thither  also.  If  you 
see  nothing  but  your  manuscript,  your  hearers  will  not  see 
much  in  that.  And  if  you  have  not  gotten  your  manu- 
script from  God^  your  hearers  will  get  little  of  God's  thoughts 
from  you.  Your  notes  may  have  come  from  God's  word, 
but  if  you  yourself  do  not  look  up  to  God,  the  power  of 
God's  word  will  not  be  in  them.  A  man  needs  as  much 
help  from  God  to  preach  a  written  sermon,  as  he  does  an 
extempore  one  ;  nay,  perhaps  more  ;  for  a  fluent  extempore 
speaker  may  preach  a  torrent  of  mere  words  with  some 
warmth  to  the  hearer,  if  there  be  a  fervent  manner,  when, 
if  the  torrent  had  been  confined  to  a  manuscript,  it  would 
have  proved  a  very  cold  shower,  or  a  mere  damp  drizzle. 
There  is,  indeed,  too  much  of  this  drizzle  in  preaching. 

Good  thoughts  in  notes  are  iapt  to  have  more  value,  but 
they  do  not  make  so  much  noise^  as  light  thoughts  in  specie. 
Your  hearers  themselves  must  be  in  the  habit  of  going  to 
the  bank  to  prove  your  notes,  and  then  they  will  find  out 
their  value.  If  you  got  them  at  the  bank  of  heaven,  your 
hearers  will  find  that  they  are  of  more  value  than  extempore 
silver.  If  you  only  made  them  yourself,  they  will  be  worth 
nothing  at  all.  A  handful  of  extempore  six-pences,  pro- 
cured at  the  mint,  will  be  better  than  hundreds  of  pounds 
signed  only  by  yourself  on  paper.  But  if  you  did  get  your 
notes  at  the  bank,  your  hearers  will  know  it,  even  while 
you  are  issuing  them ;  there  being  always  an  indefinable 
demonstration  in  the  air  and  manner  of  the  man  who,  as 
Matthew  Wilkes  says,  "  looks  up  there^''  that  makes  his 
hearers  feel  and  say  involuntarily,  He  got  that  note  at  the 


LOOKING    UP    THERE,    AND    DOWN   HERE.  177 

bank  ;  it  has  the  stamp  of  Heaven's  chancery.  But  heavy 
notes  need  more  feeling  in  their  issue,  in  their  delivery,  than 
light  extempore  sixpences.  You  may  make  much  jingle 
with  the  latter,  and  this  will  pass  with  many  for  fervor,  but 
with  the  former,  unless  you  have  the  fervor  which  is  ob- 
tained only  by  ''  looking  up  there^'*  you  will  make  but 
little  impression  on  others,  and  even  the  notes  which  you 
get  from  the  word  of  God  will  make  but  little  impression 
on  yourself. 

The  word  of  God  needs  the  Spirit  of  God,  and  while  the 
word  of  God  may  be  studied  in  the  letter^  and  preached  in 
the  letter^  merely  by  ''  looking  down  here^''  the  Spirit  of 
God  can  be  obtained  only  by  "  looking  up  there P  It  is 
only  the  preacher,  who  looks  up  there^  that  knows  how  to 
look  down  here  aright.  The  same  may  be  said  of  all  Chris- 
tians, of  hearers  as  well  as  preachers.  Matthew  Wilkes' 
word  is  as  good  for  one  as  the  other.  The  more  you  look 
to  God,  the  less  you  will  find  it  necessary  to  look  to  man. 
The  more  you  look  to  God,  the  better  you  will  know  how 
to  look  to  his  word,  and  the  more  you  will  see  of  him  in  it. 
And  as  to  notes  in  the  pulpit,  the  more  you  are  in  the  habit 
of  looking  up  to  God  before  you  go  to  church,  the  more  you 
will  see  of  God  in  the  preacher,  and  the  more  you  will  re- 
ceive from  God  through  the  preacher,  if  indeed  he  himself 
is  more  in  the  habit  of  looking  up  there,  than  down  here. 
And  if  not,  the  hearer  will  know  it.  But  whether  the 
preacher  looks  up  to  God  or  not,  it  is  none  the  less  your 
duty  to  do  so.  And  it  ought  to  be  remembered  that  the 
more  you  look  up  there,  the  more  the  preacher  will  look  up 
there  also.  The  way  a  church  looks  has  a  great  influence 
on  the  way  a  minister  looks.  Wherefore,  let  all  look  up  to 
God. 

8* 


RAKING  WITH  THE  TEETH  UPWARDS. 


We  were  amused  with  the  account  given  by  a  sensible 
old  farmer,  of  a  minister  of  his  acquaintance,  who  he 
thought  preached  rather  too  smoothly,  with  too  little  appli- 
cation to  the  conscience.  *'  Why,"  said  he,  *'  he  seems  to 
be  a  good  man,  but  he  will  rake  with  the  teeth  upwards." 
Now  this  is  very  expressive ;  there  is  much  meaning  in  it. 
Raking  with  the  teeth  upwards  is  tis  bad  as  sowing  upon 
fallow  ground  without  breaking  it  up.  Raking  with  the 
teeth  upwards  will  never  gather  the  hay.  Raking  with 
the  teeth  upwards,  or  harrowing  in  the  same  manner,  will 
smooth  over  the  field,  but  will  neither  rake  in  the  seed,  nor 
rake  out  the  weeds.  A  preacher  knows  not  how  to  do  his 
work,  who  rakes  with  the  teeth  upwards.  The  teeth  of 
the  gospel  are  not  set  in  this  way,  but  point  down,  into  the 
heart  and  the  conscience. 

Men  of  the  world,  and  men  after  it,  do  not  rake  with 
the  teeth  upwards,  but  downwards.  Politicians  often  rake 
with  the  teeth  upwards.  Flatterers  always  do,  but  the 
work  which  they  do  is  not  raking,  but  smoothing  and  cov- 
ering over.  Raking  with  the  teeth  upwards,  in  a  preacher, 
is  handling  the  word  of  God  deceitfully.  Raking  with  the 
teeth  upwards  is  Satan's  work ;  ye  shall  not  surely  die. 
Paul  raked  the  Corinthians  with  the  teeth  downwards,  and 
made  them  both  sore  and  sorry.  They  sorrowed  to  repent- 
ance, and  in  this  Paul  rejoiced,  for  the  gospel  rake  in  his 
hand  had  done  its  work  effectually. 


RAKING    WITH    THE    TEETH   UPWARD.  179 

In  the  pursuit  of  riches,  men  rake  with  the  teeth  down- 
wards. There  is  Bunyan's  Muckrake,  for  example.  Men 
must  rake  with  the  teeth  downwards,  if  they  expect  either 
to  rake  out  principles  or  riches.  Good  principles,  the 
things  of  sterling  wisdom,  are  below  the  surface,  and  men 
must  not  only  rake,  but  dig  for  them. 

The  work  of  the  gospel  is  not  surface  work,  but  deep 
work.  The  gospel  husbandry  needs  to  be  carefully  and 
prayerfully  performed.  If  men  go  sowing  their  seed  by 
the  wayside  without  care,  the  fowls  of  the  air  will  come 
and  devour  it.  There  may  be  whole  baskets  of  good  seed, 
but  if  it  is  thrown  away  in  this  manner,  little  good  can 
come  of  it.  Here  and  there  a  seed  mai/  take  root,  but  the 
likelihood  is  otherwise.  The  good  husbandman  will  stir 
the  soil,  if  possible,  and  not  throw  his  seed  to  the  fowls. 

Our  tract  distributors  are  in  one  sense  wayside  sowers. 
But  then,  if  they  are  faithful,  they  stir  the  soil,  they  use 
the  rake  with  the  teeth  downwards.  Whenever  they  can 
find  a  bit  of  soil  that  promises  well,  they  soften  and  pre- 
pare it  as  much  as  possible,  while  dropping  in  the  seed. 
Nor  must  the  seed  be  withheld,  because  the  soil  is  not 
promising,  or  because  they  are  not  permitted  to  use  the 
rake  or  the  harrow.  Wherever  soil  is  found,  there  the 
seed  ought  to  be  dropped ;  and  prayer  itself,  if  nothing  else 
can  be  used,  may  be  both  spade,  rake,  and  harrow.  And 
when  the  rain  of  the  Spirit  falls,  the  seed,  though  "buried 
long  in  dust,"  shall  be  quickened. 


HEART-LEARNING. 


It  is  a  striking  idiomatic  phrase  of  our  language  in  the 
lips  of  children,  learning  by  heart.  "  I  have  got  it  all  by- 
heart,  every  vvrord  of  it."  Things  got  by  heart  are  generally 
lasting.  But  there  is  a  great  difference  between  getting 
things  by  heart  and  getting  them  by  rote.  Some  things 
may  be  learned  by  rote,  others  can  be  learned  only  by 
heart.  Too  much  of  our  learning  is  mere  rote-learning, 
too  little  of  it  is  real  heart-learning.  Heart-learning  is  the 
best ;  heart-learning  stays  by  us. 

Heart-learning  is  the  only  true  learning  in  the  School  of 
ChrisE  There  is  head-learning,  book-learning,  word-learn- 
ing, chapter-and- verse-learning,  system-learning,  but  if  it 
does  not  come  to  heart-learning,  it  is  all  useless.  Heart- 
learning  is  heaven's  learning.  The  angels  know  all  things 
by  heart,  and  the  head-learning  of  saints  oq  earth,  in  pro- 
portion as  they  get  near  to  heaven,  is  all  changed  into  heart- 
learning.  Heart-learning  is  that  celestial  geometry,  of  which 
the  Apostle  speaks,  the  comprehension  of  the  breadth  and 
length,  the  height  and  depth  in  the  love  of  Christ,  which 
passeth  knowledge.  Heart-learning  is  the  book  of  faith's 
natural  philosophy,  whereby  we  can  understand  that  the 
worlds  were  framed  by  the  word  of  God,  and  can  hear  their 
music, 

"  Forever  singing  as  they  shine 
The  hand  that  made  us  is  Divine." 

Heart-learning  is  the  origin  of  true  lip-learning,  for  with 


HEART-LEARNING.  181 

the  heart  man  believeth  unto  righteousness,  and  then  with 
the  mouth  confession  is  made  unto  salvation,  and  the  con- 
versation is  with  grace,  seasoned  with  the  salt  of  Heaven. 
But  on  the  other  hand,  if  any  man  seem  to  be  religious  and 
bridleth  not  his  tongue,  but  deceiveth  his  own  heart,  that 
man's  religion  is  vain.     He  has  no  heart-learning. 

True  scriptural-learning  and  true  theological-learning  is 
heart-learning.  Many  things  may  be  gotten  by  the  head, 
and  there  are  many  head- theologians,  very  subtle  and  spec- 
ulative. But  theology  must  be  gotten  by  heart,  or  it  is 
worthless.  Head-learning  may  be  other  men's  learning ; 
heart-learning  is  our  own.  Head-learning  is  second-hand 
and  imitative ;  heart-learning  is  original.  Head-learning 
is  dry  study  ;  heart-learning  is  experience.  Head-learning 
is  often  filled  up  without  prayer ;  heart-learning  is  gotten 
on  one's  knees,  and  with  sighs  and  tears. 

The  lessons  which  are  learned  by  heart,  without  prayer, 
have  to  be  unlearned,  for  they  are  mostly  the  lessons  of  our 
depravity.  If  not  unlearned  and  repented  of,  they  are  les- 
sons of  misery.  The  lessons  of  God's  grace,  learned  by 
heart,  stay  by  us  to  eternity,  and  bless  us  forever  increas- 
ingly. The  lessons  of  Divine  grace,  once  learned,  are  never 
forgotten.  Happy  are  they  in  whom  the  lessons  of  the 
word  are  lessons  of  grace,  lessons  gotten  by  heart.  ''  Thy 
word  have  I  hid  in  my  heart,  that  I  may  not  sin  against 
thee." 


MORAL   DAGUERREOTYPES 


One  is  struck  with  amazement  at  the  endless  variety  of 
expression  fixed  by  the  sun,  and  every  instant  there  may 
be  a  new  one.  Now  there  is  a  moral  in  all  this.  It  shows 
what  a  record  there  may  be,  when  we  little  think  of  it,  of 
what  we  do  and  what  we  are. 

The  sun  takes  our  likenesses  by  the  process  of  the  Da- 
guerreotype. No  matter  what  the  expression  may  be, 
there  it  is.  There  is  neither  concealment  nor  flattery.  The 
sun  takes  exactly  what  he  finds.  If  it  be  beauty  or  deform- 
ity, a  noble  emotion  or  a  vile  one,  it  is  all  the  same  to 
this  impartial  painter.  He  will  not  heighten  the  one,  nor 
diminish  the  other,  but  brings  out  every  feature,  with 
every  touch  of  character.  All  this  without  our  interven- 
tion, at  least  without  our  will.  There  needs  but  to  be 
given  a  face,  and  the  sun  will  take  it. 

And  what  if  this  process  were  going  on,  invisibly  to  us, 
through  some  medium  interfused  in  all  nature  ?  What  if 
every  play  of  emotion,  every  attitude,  every  design  revealed 
in  the  countenance,  every  revelation,  in  fine,  of  the  char- 
acter in  the  face  and  deportment,  were  thus  unalterably 
taken  down,  to  be  reproduced  before  us  ?  What  if  every 
image  of  ourselves  is  kept,  a  copy  of  it,  for  the  judgment  ? 
Suppose  that  a  man  could  have  his  past  being  thus  laid 
before  himself  in  a  succession  of  impressions  from  childhood 
to  manhood,  and  from  manhood  to  old  age.     Would  any 


MORAL    DAGUERREOTYPES.  183 

one  find  any  difficulty  in  deciphering  the  whole  character 
from  such  marks  ? 

Nay,  sometimes  a  man  would  need  to  have  only  a  single 
expression  of  countenance  brought  before  him,  a  single  atti- 
tude, in  order  to  wake  up  conscience,  and  throw  open  the 
door  to  a  whole  gallery  of  evil  doings  and  feelings  in  his 
past  existence.  Perhaps  such  a  series  of  Daguerreotypes 
may  be  among  the  materials  in  the  book  of  judgment  at 
the  last  day.  With  more  accuracy  than  that  with  which 
the  most  perfect  series  of  maps  or  views  present  the  face 
and  scenery  of  a  country,  men  may  find  their  whole  past 
being  reproduced  before  them. 


A  GOOD  OLD  HYMN. 


DISTEMPER,  FOLLY,  AND  MADNESS  OF  SIN. 

1.  Sin,  like  a  venomous  disease, 

Infects  our  vital  blood  ; 
The  only  balm  is  sovereign  grace, 
And  the  physician,  God. 

2.  Our  beauty  and  our  strength  are  fled, 

And  we  draw  near  to  death; 
But  Christ  the  Lord  recalls  the  dead 
With  his  almighty  breath. 

3.  Madness,  by  nature,  reigns  within, 

The  passions  burn  and  rage  ; 
Till  God's  own  Son,  with  skill  divine. 
The  inward  fire  assuage. 

4.  We  lick  the  dust,  we  grasp  the  wind,  • 

And  solid  good  despise  ; 

Such  is  the  folly  of  the  mind. 

Till  Jesus  makes  us  wise. 

We  care  not  who  criticizes  this  hymn,  or  what  authority 
pronounces  concerning  it,  or  what  collection  rejects  it,  or 
what  music  master  stumbles  at  it.  It  is  one  of  the  best 
hymns  in  the  language.  It  is  truth  expressed  with  great 
vigor,  and  in  good  taste.  It  takes  strong  hold  of  the  mind, 
and  answers  to  its  deep  convictions  in  regard  to  sin.  Sin 
is  a  venomous  disease,  madness  does  reign  within,  we  do 
lick  the  dust  and  grasp  the  wind,  and  nothing  but  divine 
grace  can  cure  us.  And  we  like  to  have  such  truth  handled, 
even  in  lines  of  poetry,  "  without  mittens."  It  is  good  to 
have  the  poet  speak  out  strongly,  even  though  he  may  lay 


DISTEMPER,    FOLLY    AND    MADNESS    OF    SIN.  185 

himself  open  to  captious  objections.  Sin  is  a  venomous 
disease  ;  we  are  dust-eaters  and  wind -graspers. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  opposite  side  of  the  picture  is 
presented  with  equal  truth  and  beauty.  The  Physician, 
the  grace,  the  medicine,  are  brought  to  view.  And  this  is 
done  with  so  much  skill  in  each  of  the  stanzas,  that  the 
alternation  is  very  striking,  and  would  render  this  hymn 
peculiarly  adapted  to  be  sung  by  the  choir  in  responses,  or 
to  be  sung  with  such  corresponding  alternations  in  the 
expression  of  the  music,  as  would  render  it  exceedingly 
impressive. 

We  must  confess,  that  the  taste  which  would  reject  such 
a  hymn  as  this,  is  over-rigid  for  us.  It  contains  in  the 
original  six  stanzas.  It  is  not  necessary  to  print  them  all, 
nor  to  sing  them  all,  though  five  of  them  are  very  good. 
But  the  four  which  we  have  given  are  admirable.  And  we 
do  maintain  that  it  is  not  the  business  of  a  hymn-composer, 
or  a  hymn-book  maker  to  be  consulting  the  organist  or  the 
tune-master,  and  inquiring  of  him  how  he  shall  regulate 
the  expression  of  religious  truth  and  feeling.  A  pretty 
business  it  is,  indeed,  if  before  the  poet  can  choose  the 
strong  word  which  best  conveys  the  strength  of  his  idea  or 
feeling,  he  is  to  run  to  the  leader  of  the  choir  to  ask  how  it 
will  set  in  music  !  And  a  still  prettier  business  it  is,  if, 
when  a  hymn  has  been  written,  rugged  and  stern  it  may 
be,  but  deeply  expressive,  you  are  to  have  it  ground  down 
at  the  instigation  of  some  sage  professor  of  music,  because, 
forsooth,  it  is  not  smooth  enough — does  not  sing  easp  ! 

Let  every  man  therein  abide  in  the  same  calling  where- 
with he  was  called,  and  let  not  Watts  and  Cowper  be  sent 
to  dance  attendance  upon  the  fancies  of  modern  musical 
composers,  or  systematic  theologians,  however  excellent 
they  may  be. 


READINGS    BY  THE   WAYSIDE 


AN  EVENING'S  CONVERSATION  ON  THE  HUDSON. 


We  were  reading  concerning  Joseph  of  Arimathea,  how- 
he  hewed  a  new  sepulchre  out  of  the  rock,  for  himself. 
He  little  thought,  when  he  was  doing  this,  that  he  was  pre- 
paring a  place  for  the  body  of  the  Saviour.  So  those  who 
are  Christ's  shall  often  have  the  privilege  of  laboring  for 
him,  even  when  they  see  no  farther  end  than  their  own 
necessities  or  death.  As  all  things  shall  work  together  for 
good  to  those  who  love  God,  so  all  things  that  they  do  shall 
work  in  the  end  for  God's  glory.  Hewing  tombs  or  build- 
ing houses,  if  the  heart  is  right,  they  shall  do  all  for  Christ. 

But  a  great  many  men  do  good  without  wishing  it,  and 
then  they  have  no  more  concern  in  it  than  the  wires  of  the 
telegraph  have  with  their  transmitted  tidings.  The  heart 
must  be  right.  Angry  men,  that  swear  at  God,  do  not 
mean  to  glorify  him,  and  yet  God  makes  even  the  wrath 
of  man  to  praise  him.  A  great  many  men  do  some  good 
in  their  lives,  without  knowing  it,  without  intending  it,  at 
random  and  by  accident ;  just  as  squirrels  plant  acorns 
for  their  own  eating,  which  afterwards  grow  up  into  oaks. 
A  great  many  of  the  oaks,  which  God  takes  to  build  the 
ships  of  his  providence  and  the  highway  of  the  gospel,  are 
thus  planted  and  grown  by  the  care  of  human  selfishness. 


I 


READINGS    BY    THE    WAYSIDE.  187 

But  only  good  men  have  a  heart  as  well  as  a  hand  in  ac- 
complishing God's  purposes.  A  wretched  thing  it  is  for  an 
immortal  soul  to  be  used  in  a  great  enterprise,  and  after- 
wards by  the  necessity  of  its  own  selfishness,  to  be  thrown 
away. 

II. 

Again  we  were  reading  concerning  the  young  man  in 
the  gospel,  who  came  to  Christ  running.  Men  that  expect 
to  be  saved  by  their  works  sometimes  move  quicker  in 
what  seems  to  be  the  right  way  than  others,  but  the  heart 
is  not  right.  He  came  running,  though  his  heart  was  filled 
with  this  world,  because  he  expected  to  be  saved  by  what 
he  had  done  and  would  do.  He  came  running,  because  he 
intended  to  have  the  gospel  and  the  world  together.  But 
if  he  had  had  to  give  up  the  world  and  his  great  riches 
before  beginning  to  come,  he  would  have  set  out  slowly. 
He  would  have  walked  first,  and  afterwards  ran.  It  would 
have  been  difficult  first,  but  easy  afterwards.  Now  it 
seemed  easy  first,  but  was  difficult  afterwards.  He  had  to 
go  back,  and  get  through  the  eye  of  the  needle.  But  no 
man  can  either  run  through  it,  or  jump  through  it,  nor 
can  there  be  a  railroad  through  it,  nor  indeed  can  anything 
get  through  it  but  a  broken  heart,  and  that  goes  through 
by  faith. 


in. 

In  a  ship  at  sea,  and  in  a  rapid  talk  on  board  a  steamer, 
it  does  not  take  much  time  to  go  over  a  wide  space 
of  thought.  Men  may  almost  run  through  the  omne  sci- 
bile  of  theology  and  science  in  a  certain  way.  It  whiles 
away  the  time  wonderfully  to  have  an  argument  of  inter- 
est, however  glancingly  it  be  pursued.  The  mind  some- 
times just  dots   like  a  telegraph  ;    a  few  catch- words  or 


germs  of  thought,  and  it  is  off  to  another  subject.  I  was 
sitting,  with  a  Christian  friend  and  brother,  and  something 
of  inward  sympathy  or  external  object  or  event  had  led  our 
thoughts  impressively  to  the  relation  between  the  divine 
attributes  and  the  human  mind  and  character.  I  was 
deeply  interested  in  my  friend's  train  of  thought,  which, 
with  the  interspaces  of  my  responses  was  very  much  as 
follows : — 

The  holiness  of  God !  what  a  subject !  how  little  sense 
of  it  in  men's  minds,  and  how  overpowering  has  the  realiz- 
ation of  it  proved  to  the  best  of  men !  The  prophet  Isaiah, 
for  example.  For  ought  we  know,  he  was  in  very  "  com- 
fortable frames"  of  experience,  but  when  he  has  seen  the 
vision,  and  heard  the  cry.  Holy,  holy,  holy,  there  is  no  more 
strength  or  courage  in  him.  Wo  is  me,  for  I,  a  man  of 
unclean  lips,  have  seen  the  King,  the  Lord  of  hosts  ! 

And  is  not  this,  in  another  way,  the  experience  of  every 
man,  who  realizes  his  own  sinfulness,  and  has  at  the  same 
time  any  proper  sense  of  God's  holiness  ?  I,  so  sinful  a 
creature,  says  the  Christian  to  himself,  I,  who  find  it  so 
difficult  to  keep  my  heart  fixed  on  God,  so  easy  to  wander 
from  him,  my  soul  so  often  cleaving  to  the  dust,  so  labo- 
riously rising,  if  at  all,  towards  heaven ;  what  should  I  do, 
how  could  I  stand  in  the  immediate  presence  of  a  holy 
God?  It  seems  impossible,  that  if  I  should  die  now,  I 
could  be  admitted  to  behold  him  and  enjoy  him. 

Yes,  the  soul  almost  finds  itself  saying  with  Peter,  when 
It  thinks  of  these  things,  Depart  from  me,  for  I  am  a  sinful 
man,  O  Lord !  And  nothing  but  the  grace  of  Christ,  and 
a  full  faith  in  his  blood,  with  the  experience  of  its  cleansing 
efficacy,  can  break  down  this  separating  wall,  and  enable 
the  soul  to  come  to  God  with  the  spirit  of  adoption ;  for 
any  of  God's  attributes  are  overwhelming;  in  any  of 
them  a  finite  mind  is  lost,  and  a  guilty  mind  is  mise- 
rable. 

There  is  the  simple  eternity  of  God.    There  is  no  under- 


AN    evening's    conversation    on    the    HUDSON.  189 

standing  it.  A  finite  mind  cannot  understand  it.  And 
after  millions  of  ages  have  rolled  away,  it  will  still  be  as 
incomprehensible  as  ever,  to  the  highest  intelligences. 
The  mind  pursues  it  sometimes  to  the  verge  of  madness. 

And  the  incomprehensibility  of  God,  and  the  nature  of 
the  human  mind,  show  that  nothing  less  than  God  can 
satisfy  the  soul,  while  at  the  same  time  the  holiness  of 
God  would  make  the  guilty  soul  miserable. 

That  nothing  less  than  God  can  satisfy  the  soul  is  plain 
on  the  slightest  consideration  of  the  matter.  To  all  finite 
things  and  employments  the  mind  will  become  accustomed, 
and  would  be  so  accustomed  during  the  lapse  of  ages,  as 
to  be  wearied  of  them  all.  Suppose  the  engineer  of  this 
boat  were  shut  up  to  his  employment  for  a  thousand  years. 
It  would  be  torture  to  him,  from  the  mere  monotony.  And 
if  an  immortal  mind  were  the  regent  of  a  whole  material 
universe,  and  were  shut  up  to  that,  ivithout  God^  there 
would  come  a  time,  in  the  course  of  eternity,  when  the 
monotony  would  be  intolerable.  If  such  a  thing  could  be 
conceived,  as  that  there  were  no  God,  immortality  would 
go  about  the  universe  panting  after  God,  dying  for  want 
of  God.     Nothing  but  God  can  satisfy  the  soul. 

But  what,  when  to  this  you  add  the  consideration  of  a 
holy  God  and  a  sinful  soul !  Where  in  the  universe  can  a 
soul  that  does  not  love  God  go,  to  get  out  of  the  way  of 
him  ?  Everything  in  the  universe  will  bring  him  to  mind, 
even  if  consciousness  and  conscience  did  not.  Everything 
will  speak  of  him.  The  soul  must  love  God,  or  in  the 
bare  want  of  that  love,  if  there  were  no  other  hell,  it 
would  be  miserable.  It  would  be  ever  in  the  presence  of 
an  enemy.  Just  suppose  that  the  builder  of  this  boat  had 
put  his  name  and  idea  on  every  part  of  it,  in  all  these 
ornaments,  all  these  pictured  panels,  so  that  wherever  the 
eye  should  turn,  it  would  encounter  nothing  but  what 
brought  the  name  and  character  of  the  builder  to  view; 
and  suppose  that  a  mortal  enemy  of  this  builder  should 


190  AN    evening's    conversation    on    the    HUDSON. 

have  to  take  passage  in  this  boat,  should  be  shut  up  in  it, 
where  every  one  is  speaking  of  the  builder  and  praising 
his  skill  continually,  and  where  the  eye  or  the  mind  cannot 
rest  without  being  reminded  of  him.  He  would  wish  for 
another  boat.  He  could  not  endure  it.  So  with  the  soul 
and  God.  An  enemy  of  God  would  wish  to  be  out  of  the 
universe.  But  there  is  no  other  boat,  and  God  is  every- 
where. 

The  conversation  then  passed  to  the  7th  of  Romans,  and 
the  jejuneness  and  poverty  of  the  method  of  interpretation, 
which  would  take  an  unconverted  man  as  the  subject  of 
the  experience  at  the  close  of  it,  "I  find  then  a  law  in  my 
mind,"  &c.  "  I  delight  in  the  law  of  God  after  the  inward 
man,"  "O  wretched  man  that  I  am,"  &c.  ''What  I 
hate  that  I  do,"  &c.  Where  in  the  world  ever  yet  was 
the  unconverted  sinner  who  hated  sin  ?  What  unconverted 
man  ever  hates  sin,  except  by  the  mere  experience  of  its 
evil  consequences  ? 

How  exquisitely  beautiful  is  the  Christian  Poet  Cowper's 
Essay  on  Conversation  !  What  admirable  sense,  wit, 
humor,  piety,  delicacy  of  thought,  refinement  and  depth  of 
feeling  ! 

But  conversation,  choose  what  theme  we  may, 
And  chiefly  when  religion  leads  the  way. 
Should  flow  like  waters  after  summer  showers, 
Not  as  if  raised  by  mere  mechanic  powers. 

How  refreshing  are  such  showers,  and  the  brooks  that 
gladden  the  earth,  running  in  green  pastures.  A  fountain 
in  a  park,  set  playing  according  to  a  city  ordinance  at  cer- 
tain hours,  is  a  thing  to  gaze  at,  and  the  children  with 
their  nurses  run  round  it  delighted.  But  a  running  brook 
among  the  woods  and  meadows, — that  is  the  perfect  image 
of  a  natural  stream  of  talk,  especially  Christian  talk,  flow- 
ing from  the  abundance  of  a  heart  renewed  by  grace.  The 
Poet  Cowper  would  not  sadden  the  social  scene,  but  he 
regarded  the  proper  medium  between  the  wise  man's  sad- 


i 


AN    evening's    conversation    on    the    HUDSON.  191 

ness  and  the  fool's  laughter  as  hard  to  hit,  though  his  own 
native  humor  was  always  sparkling,  even  in  the  midst  of 
gloom.  How  beautiful  the  conclusion  of  his  Poem  on  this 
subject ! 

But  though  life's  valley  be  a  vale  of  tears, 

A  brighter  scene  beyond  that  vale  appears, 

Whose  glory,  with  a  light  that  never  fades, 

Shoots  between  scattered  rocks  and  opening  shades, 

And  while  it  shows  the  land  the  soul  desires, 

The  language  of  the  land  she  seeks  inspires. 

Thus  touched,  the  tongue  receives  a  sacred  cure 

Of  all  that  was  absurd,  profane,  impure ; 

Held  within  modest  bounds,  the  tide  of  speech 

Pursues  the  course  that  Truth  and  Nature  teach ; 

No  longer  labors  merely  to  produce 

The  pomp  of  sound,  or  tinkle  without  use. 

Where'er  it  winds,  the  salutary  stream, 

Sprightly  and  fresh,  enriches  every  theme, 

While  all  the  happy  man  possessed  before, 

The  gift  of  Nature,  or  the  classic  store, 

Is  made  subservient  to  the  grand  design 

For  which  Heaven  formed  the  faculty  divine. 

So,  should  an  idiot,  while  at  large  he  strays. 

Find  the  sweet  lyre  on  which  an  artist  plays. 

With  rash  and  awkward  force  the  chords  he  shakes, 

And  grins  with  wonder  at  the  jar  he  makes. 

But  let  the  wise  and  well-instructed  hand 

Once  take  the  shell  beneath  his  just  command, 

In  gentle  sounds  it  seems  as  it  complained 

Of  the  rude  injuries  it  late  sustained ; 

Till,  tuned  at  length  to  some  immortal  song. 

It  sounds  Jehovah's  name,  and  pours  his  praise  along. 

Let  your  speech  be  always  with  grace,  an  Apostle  says, 
seasoned  with  salt.  This  does  not  exclude  occasional 
mirthfulness,  but  commands  that  it  be  always  pure  and 
innocent.  There  may  be  great  excellence  in  hearty  laugh- 
ter, especially  when  it  is  irresistible.  Laughing  is  said  to 
be  good  for  the  health,  and  doubtless  it  is,  if  not  immod- 
erate ;  good  for  the  health  both  of  body  and  mind. 

Every  good  laugh,  some  old  French  writer  remarked, 
adds  one  link  to  the  chain  of  our  existence.  But  there 
is  a  great  difference  between  hearty  laughter,  and  friv- 


192         AN    evening's    conversation    on    the    HUDSON. 

olous  laughter;  and  the  laughter  of  fools  is  like  the 
crackling  of  thorns  under  a  pot ;  a  most  pithy  comparison. 
A  man  to  hear  the  snapping  of  such  fuel,  would  think 
there  must  be  a  great  fire ;  it  would  boil  any  pot  in  crea- 
tion ;  but  after  all  it  is  nothing  but  noise  without  heat,  nor 
is  anything  more  wearisome.  Sensible  laughter,  on  the 
other  hand,  is  excellent  in  its  place. 


PRAYER    AND    FASTING. 


This  kind  goeth  not  out  but  by  prayer  and  fasting. — 
What  kind  ?  A  kind  of  hard,  inveterate  devils,  that  get 
into  the  heart  and  stay  there.  They  used  of  old  to  take 
the  form  of  lunatics,  and  often  cast  men  into  the  fire,  and 
often  into  the  water.  But  they  have  changed  somewhat 
their  mode  of  operation,  and  having  hecome  more  refined 
and  quiet,  more  cunning  and  less  tangible,  are  far  more 
difficult  to  be  cast  out.  They  know  better  how  to  keep 
concealed,  and  how  to  act  without  violence.  They  used  to 
inhabit  only  the  hearts  of  pagans,  and  men  dead  in  tres- 
passes and  sins,  but  since  they  have  tried  successfully  the 
experiment  of  going  into  a  heart  empty  and  swept  and  gar- 
nished, and  set  up  an  establishment  there,  they  often  steal 
into  the  hearts  of  God's  own  people,  yea,  sometimes  seven 
devils  of  them  together,  making  no  noise,  but  all  so  quietly 
and  gradually,  that  the  poor  deceived  heart  does  not  even 
know  their  entrance. 

But  when  they  have  so  got  in,  it  is  sad  havoc  that  they 
make  with  a  man's  piety.  They  fill  the  heart  with  tombs 
and  desert  places,  they  cast  out  its  warm  affections,  and 
introduce  habits  of  coldness  and  conformity  to  this  world. 
They  go  so  far,  oftentimes,  as  to  make  secret  prayer  and 
family  prayer  to  beeome  a  mere  form  and  a  burthen,  and 
the  word  of  God  a  sealed,  unattractive  book.  Sometimes 
for  a  season  they  get  so  completely  the  mastery,  that  there 
is  nothing  in  the  heart  or  the  habits  that  can  be  called  se- 
cret prayer  at  all.     But  when  this  is  the  case,  then  gen- 

9 


194  PRAYER    AND    FASTING, 

erally  they  are  on  the  eve  of  some  daring  and  riotous  out- 
break. They  will  take  possession  of  men  thus  secretly 
mastered,  as  if  they  were  swine,  and  will  make  them  run 
violently  down  the  steep  places  of  their  passions  into  the 
sea  and  perish  in  the  waters.  And  they  who  do  not  go 
thus  outwardly  lunatic  are  none  the  less  to  be  pitied,  so  long 
as  the  -devils  stay  secretly  within  them,  and  wander  from 
room  to  room,  eating  up  all  the  piety  they  can  find,  and 
destroying  all  the  soul's  spiritual  power  and  comfort. 

This  kind  goeth  not  out  but  by  prayer  and  fasting.  But 
a  man  who  has  had  these  devils  a  long  time,  gets  entirely 
out  of  the  habit  of  such  prayer  and  fasting  as  are  requisite 
to  overcome  them.  They  are  like  rats,  that  stay  and  thrive 
in  houses  where  there  is  much  feasting  and  good  cheer. 
Where  there  is  little  prayer  and  fasting,  they  have  all 
things  to  their  own  mind,  and  grow  strong  and  multiply. 
Then  it  becomes  more  and  more  difficult  for  the  man  that 
entertains  these  devils  to  pray  and  fast ;  but  yet  prayer 
and  fasting  become  more  and  more  necessary,  if  he  would 
ever  get  back  the  command  over  himself,  if  he  would  have 
the  Lord  Jesus  overcome  and  bind  and  cast  out  the  devils, 
and  the  Holy  Spirit  enter  and  make  the  heart's  chambers 
his  own  pure  and  peaceful  abode. 

In  all  spiritual  duties,  when  there  is  the  greatest  neces- 
sity for  them  by  reason  of  the  sad  declining  state  of  the 
heart,  then  they  are  the  most  tedious  and  difficult.  It  is 
so  with  fasting  and  prayer,  when  there  are  many  devils. 
And  sometimes  the  whole  church  gets  into  such  a  state 
that  you  might  as  easily  move  a  mountain  with  a  bodkin,  as 
set  it  of  a  truth  to  fasting  and  prayer.  When  there  has 
been  a  long  period  of  worldliness,  comfort  and  ease,  when 
Ephraim  in  prosperity  has  got  settled  on  his  lees,  it  is  a 
very  difficult  thing  to  disturb  him.  The  mere  appoint- 
ment of  a  day  of  fasting  and  prayer  will  not  do  it.  The 
mere  formal  observance  of  a  day  of  prayer  and  fasting  will 
not  do  it.     No,  not  though  there  be  a  good  attendance  on 


PRAYER    AND    FASTING.  195 

such  a  day,  and  good  prayer-meetings  attending  it,  and 
good  Christians  going  without  their  dinners,  and  congrat- 
ulating themselves  that  there  is  once  more  a  fast  day  in 
the  church.  Oh  no,  that  will  not  do  it.  Many  a  man 
may  go  without  his  dinner  to  frighten  the  devils,  but  invite 
them  all  back  again  at  sapper.  Oh  no,  unless  the  fasting 
comes  from  the  heart,  and  the  heart  weeps  and  prays  in 
secret,  there  is  nothing  gained.  Real  fasting  and  prayer 
is  hard  work,  w^hen  the  evils  in  the  heart  have  grown 
quietly  and  unperceived,  and  have  lain  undisturbed  in  a 
period  of  worldly  conformity. 

Alas !  a  man  has  to  buckle  on  his  armor,  and  labor  and 
tug,  and  strive,  before  he  even  finds  himself  in  such  a  state 
that  he  can  begin  to  pray  and  fast  in  earnest.  Depend 
upon  it,  ye  Christians  who  have  been  fasting  and  praying, 
because  such  a  season  has  been  appointed,  that  your  work 
is  but  commenced  in  the  observance  of  such  a  day.  It  is 
a  season  given  you  to  start  from,  not  a  journey  gained.  It 
is  a  signal,  at  which  you  are  to  enter  into  your  closet,  and 
shut  your  door,  and  knock,  and  weep,  and  pray,  day  after 
day,  day  after  day.  Now,  if  you  begin  to  do  this  in  the 
observance  of  a  set  day  with  others,  you  are  indeed  doing 
a  great  work.  You  have  adopted  a  fast,  such  as  God 
chooses,  you  are  engaged  in  a  work  which  the  Saviour 
loves  to  see,  and  if  you  persevere,  the  devils  will  give  way 
before  you,  and  the  Holy  Spirit  will  fill  your  heart  with 
power,  and  peace,  and  joy.  But  doubtless  you  must  do 
this  as  an  individual,  and  not  in  reliance  upon  church 
meetings.  You  must  do  it  for  your  own  heart,  and  not 
merely  because  the  church  needs  reviving.  The  church 
does  need  reviving,  but  remember,  it  is  because  you  need 


FIXTURES  OF  CHARACTER 


There  is  in  life  the  period  of  seeds,  and  the  period  of 
results  or  harvests.  The  period  of  seeds  is  the  germinating 
period.  That  which  the  soul  receives  deep  into  itself  in 
that  period,  grows  up,  and  is  developed,  as  a  part  of  itself, 
and  forms  the  character  at  the  period  of  harvest.  But  if 
the  seed-period  be  neglected  or  abused,  and  then,  at  the 
period  of  harvest,  or  what  ought  to  be  that  period,  the 
period  of  results,  you  attempt  the  recurrence  of  a  seed- 
period,  it  will  be  a  failure  ;  the  seed  does  not  germinate, 
but  rots,  or  if  it  germinate,  it  dies  without  fruit,  without 
being  a  fixture  in  the  character.  Almost  everything  that 
falls  into  the  ground  but  just  goes  to  the  nourishment  and 
strengthening  of  that  which  had  got  its  fixture  and  its 
growth  before ;  or  if  the  seed  scattered  seem  to  take  root, 
it  is  but  a  feeble,  thin,  stunted  underbrush,  around  the 
trunks  and  beneath  the  shadow  of  the  old  great  trees. 
After  those  fixtures  rise  to  a  certain  height  and  age,  they 
despotize  over  everything  else  in  the  character.  We  go  on, 
indeed,  sowing  seed  all  through  life,  and  each  successive 
period  of  life  is  in  a  most  impressive  reality  a  period  of  pro- 
bation and  of  seeds  for  the  next  period ;  because,  what  we 
were  and  did  yesterday,  is  continually  coming  out  in  con- 
sequences to-day  ;  but  the  grand  seed  period,  the  period  of 
the  oaks  that  build  the  ships  in  which  our  fortunes  are 
embarked  for  eternity,  the  period  of  all  the  commanding 
fixtures  and  features  of  character,  is  ordinarily  but  one, 
and  that  one  ordinarily  early. 


FIXTURES    OF    CHARACTER. 


m 


That  early  seed-period,  and  the  germinating  and  grow- 
ing period  that  follows,  is  imaginative,  romantic,  full  of 
rich  powers  and  tendencies.  Netties  will  grow,  with  grand 
spreading  flowers,  to  the  size  of  a  forest,  if  you  sow  those  ; 
rich  fruits  and  magnificent  trees  will  grow,  if  you  sow 
those.  The  germinating,  springing  power,  in  our  immortal 
nature,  is  in  one  sense  omnipotent ;  it  will  be  exercised,  if 
not  for  good,  then  for  evil,  and  no  created  agency  can 
restrain  it;  it  works  for  eternity,  and  with  an  intensity, 
with  which  perhaps  only  an  immortal  nature  could  work. 
The  roots  of  our  earliest  habits  twine  themselves  all  about 
our  immortality,  and  the  trunk  of  character,  strengthened 
by  such  roots,  is  immovable,  and  the  branches  spread  them- 
selves out  over  all  our  being.  Whatever,  during  the  period 
of  susceptibility  and  growing  power,  is  implanted,  takes 
strong  hold,  and  if  evil,  becomes  so  omnipotent  that  God 
only  can  cut  it  away,  and  il"  good,  it  is  almost  as  hard  to  be 
eradicated  when  once  firmly  set,  but  grows  on  even  against 
the  tendencies  of  a  deformed  nature.  So  prodigiously, 
intensely  energetic,  is  the  susceptible  period  and  growing 
power  of  our  being.  "While  it  lasts,  almost  anything  can 
be  done  with  it ;  but  by  and  by  the  susceptible  and  grow- 
ing power  is  past ;  past,  as  to  new  things,  because  almost 
every  principle  has  been  in  turn  tried,  and  the  soul  is  fully 
engaged  with  what  it  has  settled  down  upon,  and  the 
power  of  the  being  works  portentously  in  the  increase  of 
that,  but  takes  hold  of  nothing  new. 

Our  blessed  Lord  took  young  men  for  his  Apostles.  He 
could  make  anything  out  of  them  then  ;  it  was  the  sug- 
gestive period,  the  power-period  in  the  formation  of  char- 
acter. 

We  say  the  suggestive  period.  We  mean  not  the  pe- 
riod in  which  the  mind  itself  makes,  puts  forth,  or  proposes 
suggestions,  but  the  period  in  which  suggestions  are  enthu- 
siastically, romantically,  eagerly  entertained,  and  become 
the  source  of  other  suggestions.     We   use  the  expression, 


198  FIXTURES    OF    CHARACTER. 

a  suggestive  book.  It  means  a  book,  that  to  a  thoughtful 
mind  touches  a  great  many  springs  of  thought  and  feeling, 
pronounces  the  open  sesame^  to  a  great  many  doors  in  the 
rocky  but  gem-enclosing  caverns  of  the  soul ;  a  book  that 
sets  the  mind  upon  tracks  of  investigation,  and  calls  up 
shadows  of  prophetic  revelation  before  it,  making  it  ear- 
nestly inquisitive  ;  a  book  that  like  a  flash  of  lighting  in  a 
dark  summer's  night  reveals  for  the  moment  a  whole  hori-- 
zon.  Now  such  a  book  ordinarily  affects  a  young  mind 
and  an  old  one  in  a  very  different  manner.  In  a  young 
mind  it  meets  a  growing,  germinating  power,  an  enthu- 
siastic, imaginative,  impressible,  impulsive  tendency,  and 
carries  the  mind  onward  to  results.  In  an  old  mind  it  stops 
at  the  threshold  where  you  have  laid  it ;  it  enters  not  into 
the  activity  of  the  being.  Old  men  may  make  suggestions, 
but  cannot  so  easily  receive  them.  If,  during  their  sug- 
gestive period,  they  received  and  acted  upon  good,  rich,  no- 
ble, powerful  suggestions,  under  which  magnificent  habits 
of  character  and  life  were  formed,  then,  when  their  own 
susceptibility  to  impressions,  new  impressions  of  thought 
and  feeling,  their  germinating  period,  is  gone,  they  will  still 
be  able  to  communicate  power,  to  electrify  others ;  their 
sowing  time  in  the  hearts  and  minds  of  others  shall  never 
be  gone,  if  their  own  receiving  time  and  growing  time 
from  others  was  rightly  improved.  Hence  the  Apostle  John 
could  touch  the  keys  of  revelation  when  he  was  old,  could 
pour  the  light  of  truth  divine  upon  the  minds  of  others, 
even  when  he  had  received  all  that  he  ever  would  or  could 
receive  from  others.  Hence  Dr.  Payson,  when  dropping  his 
mantle  of  mortality,  could  throw  the  mantle  of  his  piety, 
and  the  flame  of  his  rejoicing  soul  upon  the  watchers 
around  him,  long  after  he  had  ceased  to  receive  any  new 
suggestions  or  excitements  from  the  things  of  earth,  or  the 
discipline  of  heaven. 

Now  this  suggestive  period  seems  with  some  to  be  longer, 
and  with  some  shorter,  just  as  the  growing  and  developing 


FIXTURES    OF    CHARACTER.  199 

period  is  various  with  different  individuals.  But  it  seems 
to  be  a  limited  period  with  all.  That  is,  there  is  a  period 
of  receptivity  and  growth,  looking  to  a  period  of  bestow- 
ment  and  results,  of  harvest  and  of  fruits.  The  period  of 
receptivity  and  growth  stops  for  the  most  part  where  the 
period  of  harvests  and  of  fruits  is  expected  to  begin,  or  ought 
to  begin.  Just  so,  there  is  the  period  of  increase  and  of 
receptivity  in  the  human  life,  and  then  the  period  of  decline 
and  of  spending.  The  energies  of  this  mortal  frame  are 
first  gathered  and  compacted,  then  thrown  off  in  prepara- 
tion for  the  grave.  First  in  our  being  is  the  period  of 
Genesis,  then  Law,  then  Prophecy,  then  Fulfilment  and 
Revelation  of  eternal  results.  Out  of  the  nature  of  the 
law  which  we  have  made  our  own,  working  in  us,  whether 
good  or  evil,  in  the  period  of  receptivity,  germination,  and 
growth,  springs  the  prediction  of  the  future,  never  mis- 
taken, never  annulled. 


SIMPLICITY, 


Simplicity  is  a  thing  that  cannot  be  learned.  It  must 
come  either  from  the  nature  of  nature,  or  the  nature  of 
grace ;  if  it  be  copied,  it  ceases  to  be  simplicity,  and  be- 
comes affectation.  But  it  is  absolutely  essential  to  the 
highest  excellence  of  character ;  all  is  but  varnish  without 
it.  Faith  in  God  is  child-like  simplicity,  parent  of  strength. 
Without  it,  all  knowledge  is  vain;  the  light  of  the  mere 
understanding,  to  use  the  strong  image  of  the  Poet  Cow- 
per,  is  only  like  a  candle  in  a  scull.  With  the  same 
deep  meaning,  Mr.  Coleridge  once  said  that  all  products  of 
the  mere  reflective  faculties  partake  of  death. 

Child-like  simplicity  is  clear-sighted,  and  sees  into  the 
soul  of  things ;  it  sees  also  the  soul  of  beauty  in  little 
things.  Simplicity  goes  hand  in  hand  with  humility,  and 
they  two  have  great  insight  and  great  enjoyment  together. 
Pride  and  self-complacency  draw  a  veil  before  insight,  and 
then  the  man  goes  about  well-nigh  blindfolded,  yet  think- 
ing that  he  sees  all  things.  Such  men  often  overlook 
things,  because  they  are  so  plain  before  them,  and  for  the 
very  reason  of  their  simplicity  and  easiness  to  be  under- 
stood. Men  are  always  looking  for  some  great  thing. 
Tell  a  proud  man  to  go  into  the  fields  and  bring  you  home 
the  sweetest  and  most  beautiful  flower  he  can  find,  and 
probably  he  will  go  with  his  head  high  up  in  the  air,  hunt- 
ing after  the  Magnolia.  He  may  tread  upon  five  thousand 
violets  by  the  way,  and  never  see  them,  never  be  conscious 
that  precisely  the  most  beautiful  and  the  sweetest  flower  is 
that  he  is  trampling  under  foot;  and  when  he  returns,  if  you 
ask  him  if  he  saw  any  violets,  very  likely  he  will  say  no. 


PART  THIRD. 


CRITICAL   AND   SPECULATIVE, 


The  fears,  the  hopes,  the  remembrances,  the  anticipations, 
the  inward  and  outward  experience,  the  beUef  and  the  faith 
of  a  Christian,  form  of  themselves  a  philosophy  and  a  sum 
of  knowledge,  which  a  life  spent  in  the  grove  of  Academus, 
or  the  painted  Porch,  could  not  have  attained  or  collected. 

Aids  to  Reflection. 


i 


i 


CHARACTERISTICS 


THE   CHRISTIAN  PHILOSOPHER.* 


I  AM  called  to  speak  of  the  memory  of  a  Christian  Phi- 
losopher. It  is  a  noble  title,  nobly  won,  though  so  few  in 
our  fallen  world  have  deserved  it.  I  do  not  feel  that  I  am 
called  to  eulogize,  but  to  set  before  you  some  among  many 
virtues  of  a  man,  whom  it  seemed  to  us  as  if  we  could  ill 
spare,  out  of  a  class  from  which,  in  this  country,  the  loss 
of  such  an  one  must  be  long  and  painfully  felt,  because,  as 
yet  our  institutions  have  produced,  and  God's  mercy  has 
granted,  so  few;  and  he  especially  seemed  to  have  just 
ripened  for  effort  and  usefulness. 

We  do  not,  to-day,  think  of  him  as  a  spirit  in  heaven, 
though  he  is  there ;  still  less  do  we  think  of  him  in  the 
grave,  where  "  the  shell  of  the  flown  bird  has  mouldered ;" 
but  we  think  of  him  as  here ;  we  seem  to  feel  his  presence 
in  the  spot  where  so  many  have  listened  to  his  instructions, 
and  still  are  ruled  by  his  spirit  from  its  urn ;  these  scenes, 
so  familiar  to  him  living,  bring  him  into  the  midst  of  us 
this  day,  just  as  he  was  on  earth,  while  absorbed  in  those 
profound  meditations  in  which  he  delighted. 

I  have  said  that  I  do  not  feel  that  I  am  called  to  eulogize, 

*  A  Discourse  commemorative  of  the  virtues  and  attainments  of  Rev.  James 
Marsh,  D.D.,  late  President,  and  Professor  of  Moral  and  Intellectual  Philosophy 
in  the  University  of  Vermont ;  delivered  before  the  Alumni  of  the  University, 
at  their  Annual  Meeting,  in  August,  1843,  and  published  at  their  request. 


204  CHARACTERISTICS    OF 

for  this  is  needless,  and  the  occasion  demands  much  more  ; 
so  does  the  memory  of  our  departed  instructor  and  friend. 
You  will  bear  with  me  then,  if  now,  not  confining  myself 
to  the  review  of  Dr.  Marsh's  personal  and  mental  excellen- 
cies, I  dwell,  for  a  little  space,  upon  some  of  the  requisites 
essential  to  the  character  of  a  Christian  philosopher.  A 
Christian  Philosopher  !  The  highest  qualities  that  can 
adorn  humanity,  must  go  to  make  up  such  a  character ; 
and  yet,  such  a  being,  we  say  it  without  hesitation,  and  not 
in  the  spirit  of  eulogy,  but  of  justice,  was  Dr.  Marsh.  And 
in  dwelling  upon  these  qualities  of  mind  and  opinion  as 
well  as  of  the  heart,  while  I  shall  speak  with  particular 
reference  to  Dr.  Marsh,  I  shall  also  speak  as  I  should  have 
been  glad  to  do  in  his  own  presence,  without  any  such  ref- 
erence suggested  ;  although,  as  I  passed  along  in  my  enu- 
meration of  particulars,  every  mind  might  say  within  itself 
of  this  excellence  Dr.  Marsh  was  an  example. 

I.  I  begin,  then,  this  enumeration,  with  the  very  obvious 
and  general  truth,  that  no  man  can  be  a  Christian  philoso- 
p/ier,  without  being  himself,  by  personal  union  with  Christ, 
through  the  regenerating  influences  of  the  Holy  Spirit,  in- 
dividually, in  the  New  Testament  sense,  and  not  by  nomi- 
nal courtesy,  a  Christian.  Philosophy  itself  needs  regene- 
rating ;  and  it  is  not  probable  that  any  but  a  true  and  deep 
Christian  will  ever  do  much  to  regenerate  it. 
'  We  might  suggest  many  reasons.  Humility  is  requi- 
site;  but  the  unregenerate  mind  is  full  of  pride.  In  the 
region  of  the  Reason  and  the  Understanding,  unregenerate 
minds  of  superior  acuteness  may  speculate  well,  may  deal 
skilfully  with  abstractions,  and  marshal  the  shadows  of  the 
cave  ;  but  when  we  come  to  the  province  of  conscience,  the 
will,  and  the  affections,  then  comes  in  the  great  fact  of 
human  depravity,  with  lights  and  shades,  which  the  unre- 
generate mind  either  does  not,  or  will  not  see,  or  is  unwill- 
ing to  acknowledge  and  follow.     Instead  of  taking  their 


THE    CHRISTIAN    PHILOSOPHER. 


^ 


stand-point  in  Christianity,  and  reasoning  towards  philoso- 
( i   F^y»  niost  men  have  taken  their  stand-point  in  philosophy, 
^-^nd  reasoned  towards  Christianity.     Hence  the  world  has 
been  greatly  plagued  with  a  philosophical  Christianity,  but 
a  Christian  philosophy  scarcely,  as  yet,  exists.     Christianity 
has  been  baptized  in  philosophy,  instead   of  philosophy  in 
Christianity  ;  or  if  philosophy  has  been  baptized,  it  has  been 
merely  christened,  not  christianized  ;  it  has  received  the 
figment  of  a  baptismal  regeneration,  rather  than  the  reality 
of  a  new  celestial  birth.     A  so-called  philosophical  Chris- 
tianity may  be  received  from  the  hands  of  rationalists  and 
deists ;  a  Christian  philosophy  can  be  received  only  from  a 
Christian  mind. 

The  remark  of  Clemens  Alexandrinus  concerning  the 
heretical  philosophers  of  his  day,  has  been  too  true  of  phil- 
osophic names  in  every  age ;  that  they  were  far  more  anx- 
ious to  appear  to  be  philosophers,  than  really  and  truly  to 
philosophize ;  more  desirous  to  gain  the  reputation  of  phi- 
losophy, than  the  reality.  Inani  ergo  sapienticc  opinione 
elati,  perpetuo  litigant,  aperte  ostendentes  se  magis  curare 
ut  videantur  philosophi,  quam  lit  philosophantiir.  In 
such  hands  a  philosophical  Christianity  has  proved  as  ineffi- 
cient for  men's  moral  reformation,  as  it  has  been  erroneous 
both  in  philosophy  and  Christianity.  The  body  of  philoso- 
phers, it  is  quaintly  but  truly  remarked  by  Thomas  Haly- 
burton  ;  and  the  remark  includes  not  only  those  whom  he 
had  in  his  eye  in  his  own  day,  but  many  who  have  flour- 
ished since  ;  "  the  body  of  philosophers  are  indeed  like  weak 
watermen  on  a  strong  stream ;  they  look  one  way  but  are 
carried  another.  Though  they  pretend  they  aim  at  the 
ruining  of  vice,  yet  really  they  do  it  no  hurt,  save  that  they 
speak  against  it.  A  few  of  the  best  of  them,  being  ashamed 
to  be  found  among  the  rest,  (swimming,  or  rather  carried 
down  the  stream  on  the  surface,  that  is,  in  open  vice,)  have 
dived  to  the  bottom,  but  really  make  as  much  way  under 
water  as  the  others  above." 


206  CHARACTERISTICS    OF 

In  the  earliest  ages  of  the  Church,  there  was  such  a  pre- 
tended philosophical  Christianity.     Perhaps,  indeed,  there 
never  was  a  period  in  the  world's  history,  when  there  pre- 
vailed such  an  extraordinary  enthusiasm  in  the  pursuit  of 
philosophy,  as  in  the  age  of  the  apostles.     And  everywhere 
it  was  philosophy  falsely  so  called.     There  never  was  a  pe- 
riod  in  which    so   many  different   sects  were   contending 
/together  on  one  and  the  same   arena.     The  world  was  a 
t//   hubbub  of  philosophers ;  everything  intellectual,  everything 
moral,   everything  religious,  took  that  turn.     There  was 
very  little  light,  and   what  there  w^as,  was  fast  becoming 
darkness.     The  culminating  point  of  light  in  the  world's 
intellect,  apart  from  revelation,  had  probably  been  reached 
in  Plato,  and  every  step  after  him  was   a   retrograde  one. 
Every  new  mixture  in  the  cauldron  of  Alexandrian  Eclec- 
ticism produced  only  a  thicker  scum  of  error.     Every  turn 
in  the  wild  medley  of  philosophic  opinions  only  made  con- 
fusion worse  confounded.     Yet  philosophy  was  the  fashion; 
*-     it  was  learning,  it  was  education,  it  was  refinement,  it  was 
yvwaig^  the  knowledge  of  God  and  of  creation,  of  good  and 
evil,  and  every  religionist  must  be  a  philosopher. 
^v    Now  it  is  not  possible  that  there  should  be  a  philosophical 
/VH|  .Christianity  for  the  mind,  till  there  is  a  New  Testament 
V_^!   Christianity  for  the  affections  ;  the  first  can  have  no  place 
in  the  mind  till  the  last  is  established  in  the  heart.     And 
herein  is  one  reason  doubtless  to  be  found,  for  the  entire  ab- 
/^"'"\  sence  of  philosophical  speculation  from  the  New  Testament 
(4-       itself,  and  for  the  constant  warnings  of  the  Apostles  against 
such  speculation.     It  was  not  merely  because  so  great  a 
portion  of  the  so-called  philosophical  speculation  that  pre- 
vailed at  that   time  was  utterly  false,   but   because  the 
world's  mind  was  not  prepared  even  for  a  true  philosophy, 
^        and  could  not  be,  until  it  was  imbued  with  a  true  religion. 
"~:     It  was  into  the  midst  of  that  agitated  chaos  of  society, 
4hat  philosophical  fermentation  of  the  world's  mind  of  which 
we  have  spoken,  that  the  first  disciples  of  Christ  were  thrown, 


THE    CHRISTIAN    PHILOSOPHER.  W9 

to  begin  their  spiritual  conflict.  We  may  find  in  the  state 
of  things  around  them^  reason  enough  why  illiterate  men, 
so  called,  were  chosen ;  if  any  had  been  taken  from  the 
schools,  a  constant  miracle  must  have  been  in  exercise  all 
along  the  course  of  inspiration,  to  preserve  them  from  per- 
petually mingling  the  fanaticism  and  the  folly  of  philosophic 
speculation  with  the  theory  and  truth  of  Christianity.  We 
may  say,  indeed,  that  there  was  such  an  exercise,  otherwise 
we  could  have  had  no  pure  unmingled  inspiration.  Amidst 
these  strong  tendencies,  with  not  only  the  Greeks,  but  the 
whole  world,  agape  after  wisdom,  the  disciples  were  set 
down  simply  to  preach  the  gospel.  It  was  a  miracle  that 
they  preached  it,  that  they  did  not  instantly,  on  the  death 
of  Christ,  set  up  a  school  of  philosophy.  But  there  they 
stood,  simple  disciples  of  an  atoning  Saviour,  and  preached 
the  Cross,  knowing  nothing  but  that,  and  determined  to 
know  nothing  among  men  save  Christ  and  him  crucified. 
Thus  they  stood  through  one  generation  at  least,  simple 
preachers  and  not  philosophers,  and  so  the  doctrines  of 
Christianity  were  fairly  and  fully  excogitated,  put  before 
the  world  in  freshness  and  simplicity.  It  was  a  wonderful 
spectacle,  a  sublime  sight,  this  light  amidst  darkness,  this  ^ 
simplicity  amidst  error,  this  order  amidst  confusion,  these 
twelve  men  going  about  like  little  children,  and  talking 
truth  as  simple  as  the  daylight,  as  blessed  and  as  easy  to 
be  understood,  amid  such  a  hubbub  of  pretensions  and 
noises,  such  universal  distortion  of  mind,  such  admiration 
and  worship  of  philosophic  darkness.  They  were  faithful^ 
to  the  Cross,  and  so  the  canon  of  the  New  Testament  was 
fixed,  and  the  truths  of  the  Cross  were  fully  and  eternally 
revealed,  without  mixture  or  sanction  of  human  error. 
The  Orb  of  Light  was  hung  up,  whatever  error  darkened 
men's  horizon  beneath  it. 

But  in  the  multitude  those  pagan,  philosophic,  specula- 
tive tendencies  remained,  and  Christianity  had  to  meet 
them  ;    and  some  minds  were  speedily  brought  into  her 


208  CHARACTERISTICS    OF 

bosom  deeply  tinctured  with  them,  and  soon  many  were 
beguiled  from  the  simplicity  of  Christ.  Heresy  entered 
with  philosophy.  Learned  converts  from  paganism  brought 
with  them  from  their  schools  the  habit  of  subtle  speculation. 
Gnostic,  Cabbalistic,  Neoplatonic  allegory  began  to  be  in 
fashion ;  professedly  Christian  teachers  contended  with  un- 
baptized  pagans  for  the  palm  of  philosophy ;  that  is,  they 
claimed  it  for  Christianity  as  a  thing  to  be  desired,  and  the 
Christian  fathers  sought  to  maintain  a  philosophic  reputa- 
tion. The  early  Christian  writers  themselves  seem  in- 
deed to  have  retired  backward  from  the  very  foot  of  the 
Cross,  from  the  very  blaze  of  inspiration,  into  the  darkness 
of  pagan  philosophy.  To  step  out  from  the  New  Testa- 
ment into  the  writings  of  the  fathers,  is  to  step  from  a 
region  of  light,  order,  certainty  and  beauty,  into  a  region 
of  dim,  disastrous  twilight,  where,  as  the  shades  of  evening 
gather,  the  forms  of  superstition  thicken,  and  the  common 
sense  and  the  simple  spiritual  sense,  so  rich  and  full  in  the 
pages  of  the  New  Testament,  almost  cease  from  existence. 
The  forms  of  divine  truth,  that  is,  of  truth  revealed  through 
the  medium  of  the  Cross,  are  dim  and  indistinct.  In  proof 
of  this,  let  any  one  look  through  the  writings  of  the  fathers, 
to  trace' the  great  doctrine  of  justification  by  faith',  so  early 
lost,  and  at  length  so  profoundly  lost  in  the  Romish  sys- 
tem, and  so  late  discovered  in  the  glorious  and  blessed 
Reformation,  after  a  thousand  years.  Let  any  sound- 
minded  Christian  take  up  any  work  of  any  Christian  father, 
the  most  evangelical,  and  compare  it  with  any  practical  or 
speculative  treatise  of  Baxter,  Howe,  Leighton,  or  other 
modern  Christian  writers,  and  he  will  be  sensible  of  the 
vast  inferiority  of  the  first  to  these  last  ages  of  Christian- 
ity, in  the  knowledge  and  possession  of  the  truth  and  spirit 
of  the  Scriptures.  There  is,  perhaps,  quite  as  strong  a 
contrast  between  the  Christian  writers  of  the  seventeenth 
century,  and  the  early  Christian  doctors,  as  that  depicted 
with  so  much  power  and  beauty  by  Mr.  Taylor,  between 


THE    CHRISTIAN    PHILOSOPHERt^  209^ 

the  books  of  the  Jewish  prophets,  and  those  of  the  Christian 
fathers  after  the  apostolic  age.  "  It  must  be  acknowledged," 
he  observes,  "that  the  writers  of  the  ancient  dispensation 
were  such  as  those  should  be,  who  were  looking  onward 
towards  the  bright  day  of  gospel  splendor  ;  while  the  early- 
Christian  doctors  were  just  such  as  one  might  well  expect 
to  find  those,  who  were  looking  onward  towards  that  deep 
night  of  superstition,  which  covered  Europe  during  the 
middle  ages.  The  dawn  is  seen  to  be  gleaming  upon  the 
foreheads  of  the  one  class  of  writers  ;  while  a  sullen  gloom 
overshadows  the  brows  of  the  other." 

If,  now,  the  history  of  Christianity  be  for  ages  only  a 
history  of  its  corruptions,  the  history  of  philosophy  for  the 
same  period  must  be  at  best  but  a  history  of  its  mistakes. 
Accordingly,  much  of  the  history  of  philosophy  must  be 
occupied  with  three  great  sources  of  error  ; — a  neglect  of  \ 
that  which  seems  to  be  known,  but  is  not ;  a  vain  pursuit 
of  that  which  cannot  be  known  ;  a  proud  endeavor  to  re- 
duce that  which  is  supernaturally  revealed,  to  the  level  of  ^ 
what  is  within  the  compass  of  our  faculties.  It  was  not 
designed  that  Christianity  should  make  the  world  philo- 
sophical, till  it  had  made  it  Christian.  But  the  history  of 
the  scholastic  and  middle  ages  show  the  world  striving 
after  philosophy,  when  it  has  not  even  become  imbued  with 
the  elements  of  Christianity.  The  one  is  impossible  with- 
out the  other  ;  and  the  consequence  is  the  occupying  the 
domain  of  philosophy  with  inane  and  useless,  though  subtle 
questions.  Accordingly,  a  great  reformation  in  philosophy 
commenced  with  the  reformation  in  religion  ;  and  it  may 
be  safely  predicted  that  just  in  proportion  as  the  world 
grows  in  the  knowledge  and  love  of  God  practically,  the 
human  mind  will  become  known  to  itself,  and  all  knowledge 
will  advance  towards  that  unity,  which  we  know  to  be 
possible  only  in  the  union  of  the  mind,  the  will,  the  affec- 
tions with  Christ  in  God. 


210  ,        CHARACTERISTICS    OF 

II.  Now,  passing  from  this  general  head,  I  shall  mention, 
as  a  second  fundamental  requisite  in  the  character  of  a 
Christian  philosopher,  the  habit  of  self-discipline,  including 
especially  that  of  self-examination.  Here  Dr.  Marsh  was 
remarkable  for  his  patience,  severity,  and  excellence.  The 
habits  of  his  mind  were  meditative  and  profound;  the 
habits  of  his  piety  being  equally  so,  he  was  a  rare  example 
of  the  union  of  severe  intellectual  and  spiritual  discipline- 
His  tendency  in  meditation  was  more  strongly  subjective 
than  objective,  more  to  thoughts  than  things,  more  to 
motives  than  actions ;  this  tendency,  we  may  see  plainly, 
helped  and  forwarded  his  communion  with  God  and  him- 
self;  and  the  habit  of  spiritual  self-examination  as  a  Chris- 
tian duty,  aided  the  habit  of  intellectual  self-examination 
as  a  philosophical  business  and  study.  As  a  sincere  Chris- 
tian, exercising  himself  herein  always  to  maintain  a  con- 
science void  of  offence  towards  men  and  towards  God,  his 
habits  of  self-examination,  both  intellectual  and  spiritual, 
were  fearless  and  impartial.  It  is  a  great  thing  not  to  be 
afraid  of  self-examination. 

On  this  subject,  I  often  think  of  Dr.  Donne's  profound 
and  condensed  stanza  : 

But  we  know  ourselves  least ;  mere  outward  shows 

Our  minds  so  store, 
That  our  souls,  no  more  than  our  eyes,  disclose 
But  form  and  color.     Only  he  who  knows 

Himself,  knows  more. 

Some  men  train  their  minds  well,  look  at  abstractions 
sharply,  accustom  themselves  to  subtle  distinctions,  and  to 
a  busy,  patient,  intellectual  self-examination.  But  they 
neglect  the  moral  and  spiritual  examination  of  their  being, 
as  they  have  neglected  from  youth  up  habitually  its  per- 
sonal spiritual  cultivation.  No  such  man  is  fitted  to  be  a 
philosopher.  Here  is  great  distortion  of  the  being ;  it  has 
all  grown  on  one  side.  Here  are  great  intellectual  excres- 
cences, but  not  the  symmetry  and  beauty,  the  truth  and 


THE    CHRISTIAN    PHILOSOPHER.  211 

certainty,  of  intellectual  life.  Here  are  abstractions,  but 
not  realities.  And  as  to  all  that  portion  *of  truth  in  God 
and  in  ourselves,  which  lies  over  against  the  part  of  our 
being  so  neglected,  the  view  of  it  and  the  conception  of 
it  in  the  mind  of  such  a  philosopher  must  inevitably  be 
erroneous ;  and  it  has  so  many  practical  connections  and 
consequences,  that  the  effect  of  such  error  spreads  even  into 
those  intellectual  abstractions,  in  which  such  minds  think 
they  are  the  subtle  masters  of  certainty. 

Other  men  train  their  hearts  better,  but  do  not  accustom 
themselves  to  habits  of  patient  abstract  thought,  nor  to  the 
examination  of  their  own  intellectual  being  and  processes. 
They  take  for  granted  what  other  men  say ;  they  read 
systems  ;  their  philosophical  studies  are  not  their  own,  but 
a  blind  pursuit  in  the  path  of  others,  a  dependent  following 
on  in  the  train  even  of  minds  that  have  known  nothing  of 
Qhristianity  practically,  but  have  merely  wandered  in  the 
labyrinths  of  intellectual  subtleties,  and  therefore  cannot 
possibly  be  our  guides  to  a  Christian  philosophy.  Such, 
for  the  most  part,  have  been  our  philosophical  writers. 
There  has  been  such  a  divorce  from  the  Christianizing,  not 
to  say  humanizing,  afiections,  in  their  writings,  that  the 
generalizing  mind  of  Burke  found  occasion  to  make  the 
remark  that  nothing  can  be  conceived  more  hard  than  the 
heart  of  a  thorough-bred  metaphysician.  These  minds 
have  been  the  tenants  of  Goethe's  circle,  and  still  are.  "  I 
tell  you,  a  fellow  that  speculates,  is  like  a  brute  driven  in 
a  circle  on  a  barren  heath,  by  an  evil  spirit,  whilst  fair 
green  meadow  lies  everywhere  around."  Such  is  specula- 
tion apart  from  Christianity.  Lord  Bacon  has  written 
some  pregnant  sentences,  as  to  the  corrosive  influences  of 
knowledge  without  love.  It  is  hardly  possible  that  any 
great  reformation  in  philosophy  can  come  from  such  sources ; 
nor  is  it  such  minds  that  can  be  safely  followed — minds 
divorced  from  hearts,  minds  neglectful  of  spiritual  self- 
examination,  and  hearts  unacquainted  with  themselves. 


212  CHARACTERISTICS    OF 

There  is  a  great  want  of  self-examination.  It  is  in  our 
very  nature ;  I  mean  our  guilty  nature,  for  a  perfectly  holy 
being  could  not  find  the  work  of  self-examination  difficult. 
Our  habits  are  those  of  inward  neglect.  And  not  only  so, 
but  some  men's  habits  of  opinion,  the  cast  of  their  religious 
system,  are  so  contrary  to  truth,  subjective  as  well  as  re- 
vealed, that  they  dare  not  go  into  thorough  self-examina- 
tion either  morally  or  intellectually.  If  they  should,  they 
would  be  sure  to  strike  upon  some  of  those  great  reefs  of 
thought  and  consciousness  buried  in  the  ocean  of  man's 
being,  and  their  system  must  suffer  shipwreck,  especially 
if  it  be  built  upon  the  assumed  purity  of  man,  and  the 
rejection  of  a  divine  atoning  Mediator.  A  man  who  is 
afraid  of  God,  of  his  just  and  holy  character  as  revealed  in 
his  word,  and  who  is  prejudiced  against  a  system"  of  truth 
which  has  a  severe  side  towards  himself  on  account  of  his 
depraved  nature,  is  not  the  being  to  become  a  philosopher, 
or  to  examine  his  own  mind  in  an  impartial,  honest,  scru- 
tinizing manner.  Hence  there  lies  against  the  investiga- 
tions of  most  of  the  great  minds  that  have  been  the  mon- 
archy of  abstraction  an  objection,  an  antecedent  probability, 
that  as  they  are  wrong  towards  God  practically,  they  can- 
not be  right  towards  man  intellectually ;  their  practical 
errors  will  produce  errors  even  in  intellectual  abstractions. 
They  are  unsafe  guides,  even  in  a  philosophy  of  nature. 
There  is  a  concealed  magnet  near  such  a  mind's  compass, 
that  in  its  investigations  turns  the  needle  out  of  its  proper 
direction.  The  witnesses  are  interested.  It  has  been  said 
by  Mri__Coleridge,  that  "  the  chameleon  darkens  in  the 
shade  of  him  who  bends  over  it  to  ascertain  its  colors." 
But  what  if  there  be  a  moral  hue  in  the  observer,  reflected 
upon  the  thing  observed,  the  quality  of  the  subject  trans- 
ferred to  the  object  ? 

What  we  need  is  the  union  of  habits  of  intellectual  ab- 
straction with  spiritual  truth,  with  devout  feeling.  With 
us  there  is  perhaps  more  of  the .  devout  feeling,  but  less  of 


THE    CHRISTIAN    PHILOSOPHER.  213 

^e  patient  intellectual  discipline.  But  this  is  absolutely- 
necessary  for  the  mental  philosopher.  Discipline  of  the 
mind  is  needed,  more  than  most  men  are  willing  to  undergo ; 
more  than  most,  even  of  our  students,  are  accustomed  to. 
For  students  in  general  are  students  of  external  books  and 
things,  and  not  of  the  constitution  and  movements  of  their 
own  minds.  They  pursue  paths  that  have  been  traced  out 
for  them ;  they  do  not  enter  the  forest  with  axe  in  hand,  to 
cut  down  the  underbrush  and  make  paths  for  themselves  to 
new  points,  or  their  own  paths  to  old  points ;  they  travel 
the  beaten  road.  Now  it  is  a  truth  that  paths  long  trav- 
elled not  only  lose  the  interest,  which  by  novelty  they  once 
possessed,  but  they  even  lose  that  power  over  the  mind, 
which  the  things  of  intrinsic  value  and  curiosity  that  lie 
along  in  them  deserve  to  exercise.  In  the  mind's  investi- 
gations, an  ell  of  one's  own  is  worth  a  mile  of  another's. 
Intellectual  regions  become  as  hacknied,  as  infested  with 
cicerones,  as  crusted  over  with  custom,  as  the  regions  of 
fashionable  travel.  Guide-books  and  hand-books  become 
so  familiar,  and  so  insufferably  minute,  that  the  possibility 
of  a  fresh  discovery  is  anticipated,  and  the  genial  excite- 
ment of  the  mind,  even  by  surprising  truth,  is  rendered 
very  difficult. 

Truth,  Democritus  said,  was  a  deep  well;  it  is  a  deep 
sea,  that  requires  experienced  and  powerful  divers,  divers 
that  can  hold  their  breath  long,  or  the  pearls  that  lie  at  the 
bottom  will  not  be  brought  up.  Many  have  gone  out  of 
their  depth,  many  have  lost  their  breath,  many  have  been 
taken  by  devious  under-currents,  and  carried  far  from  the 
point  they  have  been  diving  at.  By  and  by  their  bodies 
rise  and  float,  here  and  there  upon  the  surface.  They  are 
cast  up  upon  the  shores,  and  other  phlilosophers  devoutly 
bury  them.  A  name  is  put  upon  their  grave-stones,  and  the 
directions  are  marked,  in  which  they  are  supposed  to  have 
wandered.  Men  seem  perfectly  aware  of  these  under-cur- 
rents in  the  case  of  others,  but  yet  they  are  perpetually 


214  CHARACTERISTICS    OF 

diving  into  the  same,  and  losing  their  way,  and  in  their 
turn  dying  for  want  of  breath.  "Or,"  says  Haly burton, 
in  his  sometimes  quaint  way,  "trying  to  fetch  up  the  truth 
without  diving  for  it,  but  with  a  line  too  short,  they  fetch 
up  some  weeds  that  are  nourished  by  their  nearness  to  the 
waters,  and  please  themselves  with  those."  Yes  I  It  must 
be  confessed,  there  is  a  great  deal  of  the  sea- weed  of  phi- 
fosophy  brought  up  instead  of  shells  and  pearls ;  there  are 
regions,  however,  where  this  sort  of  weed  may  make  a 
very  good  compost  for  the  production  of  better  things  in 
the  sandy  places  on  one's  intellectual  premises. 

III.  Perhaps  it  is  of  sufficient  importance  to  mention,  as 
a  third  characteristic  of  a  Christian  Philosopher,  that  he 
w^ill  take  his  whole  being  with  him.  He  must  neither 
leave  his  Christianity  behind,  when  he  goes  into  his  philos- 
ophy, nor  his  philosophy  behind,  when  he  goes  into  his 
Christianity ;  if  he  does  either,  this  proves  there  is  a  defect; 
for  true  Christianity  and  true  philosophy  are  the  same,  and 
a  man's  being,  the  state  of  his  existence,  under  one  influ- 
ence, cannot  contradict  the  state  of  his  existence  under  the 
other.  If  he  cannot  take  his  whole  being  with  him,  whether 
on  the  one  side  or  the  other,  he  is  wrong. 

Besides  this,  there  are  idiosyncrasies  to  be  guarded 
against.  Some  men's  natural  tendency,  their  besetting 
intellectual  sin,  is  to  look  at  things  out  of  themselves,  at 
external  relations  merely,  at  the  objective  instead  of  the 
subjective ;  other  some  tend  to  the  opposite  extreme,  and 
are  so  occupied  with  their  subjective  wants  and  tendencies, 
that  they  see  almost  nothing  else.  The  first  extreme  is  the 
greatest  evil,  doubtless ;  the  last  likewise,  if  half  the  great 
body  of  truth  be  neglected,  will  lead  to  partial  and  incor- 
rect views. 

Dr.  Marsh's  philosophical  investigations  show,  that  while 
his  own  tendencies  were  subjective,  and  fitted  him  emi- 
nently for  patient  and  profound  meditation,  he  was  not  less 


"^  THE    CHRISTIAN    PHILOSOPHER.  215 

careful  in  external  observation,  calling  in  science  to  his  aid 
and  making  the  objective  and  the  subjective  reflect,  reveal 
and  minister  to  each  other.  Minds  whose  tendencies  are 
exclusively  or  chiefly  to  external  observation,  to  the  pheno- 
menal out  of  themselves,  and  v^ho  yield  to  those  tendencies, 
can  have  no  true  conception  of  a  spiritual  philosophy.  They 
are  neither  fitted  to  understand  nor  to  criticize  such  a  sys- 
tem ;  what  they  themselves  do  not  understand,-  because 
half  their  own  being  has  been  neglected,  they  deem  in  itself 
unintelligible  ;  what  is  beyond  their  own  experience,  or 
rather,  what  has  escaped  their  own  notice  of  their  own  ex- 
perience, they  sot  down  as  mysticism.  Some  remarks  of 
Mr.  Coleridge  are  strikingly  in  point.  "  A  system,"  says 
he  in  his  Biographia  Literaria,  "  the  first  principle  of  which 
it  is  to  render  the  mind  intuitive  of  the  spiritual  in  man, 
(i.  e.  of  that  which  lies  on  the  other  side  of  our  natural  con- 
sciousness,) must  needs  have  a  great  obscurity  for  those  who 
have  never  disciplined  and  strengthened  this  ulterior  con- 
sciousness. It  must,  in  truth,  be  a  land  of  darkness,  a  per- 
fect anti-Goshen,  for  men,  to  whom  the  noblest  treasures 
of  their  being  are  reported  only  through  the  imperfect  trans- 
lation of  lifeless  and  sightless  notions  ;  perhaps  in  great 
part  through  words  which  are  but  the  shadows  of  notions  ; 
even  as  the  notional  understandinsr  itself  is  but  the  shad- 
owy  abstraction  of  living  and  actual  truth.  On  the  imme- 
diate, which  dwells  in  every  man,  and  on  the  original  intu- 
ition, or  affirmation  of  it,  (which  is  likewise  in  every  man, 
but  does  not  in  every  man  rise  into  consciousness)  all  the 
certainty  of  our  knowledge  depends  ;  and  this  becomes  in- 
telligible to  no  man  by  the  ministry  of  mere  words  from 
without." 

The  greatest  evil  in  philosophy  is  that  divorce  of  the 
heart  from  the  head,  of  which  we  have  already  spoken,  from 
which  Dr.  Marsh's  deep  piety,  if  nothing  else,  would  have 
preserved  him,  and  concerning  which,  though  at  the  risk  of 
some  appearance  of  repetition  under  our  present  head,  I  shaU 


216  CHARACTERISTICS    OF  ^" 

here  add  something  more.  Dr.  Marsh  once  quoted  a  sen- 
tence from  Lactantius,  containing  the  whole  of  this  evil. 
"  Naturam  hominis  hanc  Deus  ipse  voluit^  ut  duarum  re- 
rum  cupidus  et  appetens  esset,  I'eligionis  et  sapientice.  Sed 
homines  ideo  fallnntur^  quod  aut  religionem  suscipiunt 
omissa  sapientia,  aut  sapientice  soli  strident,  oniissa  reli- 
gione,  cum  alterum  sine  altero  esse  ?ion  possit  verumP 
This  is  a  great  truth.  God  constituted  us  to  seek  religion 
and  wisdom  together.  But  men  go  to  extremes  ;  they 
either  seek  religion  without  wisdom,  or  they  seek  wisdom 
without  religion ;  whereas,  the  one  without  the  other,  can- 
not possibly  be  true. 

Mr.  Coleridge's  experience,  when  he  met,  among  the  buy- 
ers, and  sellers,  and  money-changers  in  the  temple  of  intel- 
lectual abstractions  in  Germany,  some  who  came  to  wor- 
ship with  the  heart,  is  deeply  interesting  and  instructive. 
Speaking  of  the  writings  of  Fox  and  Behmen,  he  observes 
that  they  acted  in  no  slight  degree  to  prevent  his  mind  from 
being  imprisoned  within  the  outline  of  any  single  dogmatic 
system.  "  They  contributed  to  keep  alive  the  heart  in  the 
head;  gave  me  indistinct,  yet  stirring  and  working  pre- 
sentiment, that  all  the  products  of  the  mere  reflective  fac- 
ulty partook  of  death,  and  were  as  the  rattling  twigs  and 
sprays  in  winter,  into  which  a  sap  was  yet  to  be  propelled, 
from  some  root  to  which  I  had  not  penetrated,  if  they  were 
to  afford  my  soul  either  food  or  shelter.  If  they  were  too 
often  a  moving  cloud  of  smoke  to  me  by  day,  yet  they  were 
always  a  pillar  of  fire  throughout  the  night,  during  my 
wanderings  through  the  wilderness  of  doubt,  and  enabled 
me  to  skirt  without  crossing  the-  sandy  deserts  of  utter 
unbelief"  The  true  depth  and  inmost  centre  of  science  is 
never  to  be  gained  by  those  who  take  the  mind  alone  and 
leave  the  heart  behind.  And  as  to  that  root  from  which 
alone  the  sap  can  come,  which  is  to  vivify  the  products  of 
the  reflective  faculty,  it  can  be  none  other  than  Christ. 
Without  a  vital  acquaintance  with  him,  no  man  can  pre- 


m  THE    CHRISTIAN    PHILOSOPHER.  217 

tend  to  the  character  of  a  Christian  Philosopher  [^and Xniay 
addj  that  however  distinguishfid-ibr-  iiitelkot»al  su4:)t]ety  the 
philosophers  and  the  students  of  any  nation  may  be,  if  the 
product  of  the  reflective  faculty  be  the  curse  of  a  Christ- 
less  philosophy,  the  sharpness  of  intellectual  discipline  is 
purchased  at  a  dreadful  price.  1  do  not  say  an  infidel, 
but  a  Christless  philosophy,  v^hich,  with  whatever  con- 
comitants it  may  grow  up,  must  become  one  of  the  great- 
est curses  that  can  be  fastened  on  the  literature  of  a 
people. 

IV.  A  fourth  requisite,  which  may  be  mentioned  as 
characteristic  of  a  Christian  philosopher,  is  a  candid  and 
charitable  appreciation  of  other  men's  points  of  view,  not 
views  simply,  but  points  of  view.  For  this  Christian  and 
discriminating  candor,  Dr.  Marsh's  mind  and  heart  were 
remarkable.  "  This  man  is  in  error,"  he  could  say,  "  but 
I  see  how  he  has  fallen  into  it ;  I  can  see  his  point  of  view, 
and  from  that  point  his  error  was  very  natural :  nay,  from 
that  point,  it  may  be  but  a  truth  carried  to  extremes,  or 
one  side  of  a  truth  without  the  other.  I  can  convince  him 
of  the  difficulty."  For  the  exercise  of  such  candor,  freedom 
from  self-opinion,  and  the  attitude  of  a  learner  are  always 
necessary.  Humility  of  heart,  as  well  as  acuteness  of  in- 
tellect, is  necessary  ;  and  this  was  one  of  Dr.  Marsh's 
shining  traits. 

These  qualities  were  of  eminent  advantage  to  him  in  his 
duties  as  a  teacher.  He  was  candid  almost  to  an  extreme 
in  entertaining  objections,  and  giving  them  full  play  and 
scope.  He  would  often  perceive  the  objection  laboring  in 
a  student's  mind,  and  would  proceed  to  give  it  an  expression 
more  forcibly  and  clearly  than  the  student  could  have 
done  for  himself,  so  that  it  might,  on  certain  occasions,  be 
said,  that  he  could  understand  the  mind  and  views  of  others 
better  than  they  could  themselves.  Neither  was  he  afraid 
to  let  it  be  seen,  that  while  teaching  others  he  was  himself 

10 


218  CHARACTERISTICS    OF 

a  learner.  I  am  reminded  of  a  characteristic  anecdote  of 
Dr.  Reid,  of  Scotland.  I  believe  he  relates  it  himself 
in  his  lectures  on  Moral  Philosophy.  The  class  were  reading 
Cicero  de  Finibus,  when  one  of  the  students  came  to  a  hard 
place,  which  the  doctor  himself  could  not  explain.  "  I 
thought  I  had  the  meaning,  gentlemen,"  said  he,  "  but  I 
have  not,  arid  will  be  obliged  to  any  one  who  will  construe 
it."  A  student  stood  up  and  translated  it,  and  the  doctor 
expressed  his  gratitude.  Nothing  will  win  the  affection  and 
confidence  of  students  more  surely  than  such  engaging  can- 
dor ;  it  is  the  quality  of  a  truly  great  mind.  Dr.  Marsh's 
intercourse  with  his  students  was  always  that  of  a  friend, 
and  his  instructions  were  rather  as  a  Socratic  friendly  con- 
versation, than  as  a  formal,  ex  Cathedra  statement  of  the 
truth.  In  this  way  he  gained  much  himself,  and  others 
learned  more. 

The  want  of  tliis  appreciation  of  other  men's  points  of 
view,  of  which  I  have  spoken,  has  produced  much  prejudice 
and  self-opinion,  which  have  greatly  hindered  the  progress 
of  truth.  The  habit  of  learning  from  other  men's  errors,  is 
almost  as  important  as  the  opposing  of  them  ;  but  for  this, 
it  is  necessary  not  only  to  scrutinize  the  error  as  it  comes 
before  your  own  mind,  but  to  see  it,  if  possible,  where  it 
springs  up,  to  project  yourself,  as  it  were,  into  another 
man's  associations  and  position.  The  power  of  such  ap- 
preciation, though  it  be  difficult,  and  requires  a  peculiar 
exercise  of  mind,  does  nevertheless  exist  more  than  the  de- 
sire. What  we  wish  to  say  to  an  antagonist  is  this : — 
You  have  shown  the  matter  in  your  position  ;  now  come 
hither,  and  stand  with  me,  and  see  it  in  the  light  in  which 
I  am  viewing  it.  If  this  habit  be  good  for  one  side,  it  is 
good  and  truthful  for  another ;  and  indeed  if  this  rule 
were  adopted,  one  half  the  controversies  in  the  world 
would  cease. 

It  cannot  be  denied,  that  in  most  controversies  there  is 
more  or  less  truth  on  both  sides ;  the  silver  grey  and  the 


^  THE    CHRISTIAN    PHILOSOPHER.  219 

dark  green  belonging  to  the  same  olive  leaf.  He  possesses 
a  rare  qualification  as  a  philosopher,  who  can  put  himself 
into  the  position  of  those  whose  minds  are  taking  a  different 
view  from  his  own;  who,  being  in  the  sun,  can  project 
himself  into  the  situation  of  those  who  are  standing  in  the 
shade ;  or,  being  in  the  wind,  can  project  himself  into  the 
position  of  an  observer  where  it  is  a  dead  calm. 

Dr.  Marsh's  mind  was  singularly  free  from  prejudice,  and 
disinterested  in  pursuit  of  truth.  It  was  characteristic  of 
him  that  he  shrank  from  controversy,  especially  on  the  sub- 
ject of  religion,  though  he  did  not  shrink  from  the  expres- 
sion of  his  views.  "  If  I  were  disposed  to  controversy," 
said  he,  "  it  would,  I  suppose,  be  very  easy  in  me  to  make 
a  noise  in  the  great  Babel,  but  they  make  enough  without 
my  help."  He  was  wise  in  avoiding  controversy.  The 
excitement  produced  in  it  is  too  often  distorting  and  preju- 
dicial, both  to  the  mind  and  the  heart.  And  even  as  to 
pious  feeling  itself,  it  is  too  apt  in  such  cases  to  become 
sour,  crude,  intolerant  and  caustic.  Astronomers  tell  us 
that  we  are  nearer  to  the  sun  in  December  than  in  June ; 
so  there  is  a  sort  of  dog-day  fervor  in  controversial  piety, 
in  which  the  church  may  be  really  farther  from  God  than 
in  the  dead  of  winter.  And  in  philosophy,  controversial- 
ists, going  to  extremes,  are  apt  to  retreat  each  into  an 
opposite  error. 

V.  It  were  almost  superfluous  to  speak  of  Dr.  Marsh's 
profound  reverence  for  the  Word  of  God,  his  delight  in  it, 
his  love  and  submission  to  it.  But  inasmuch  as  this  is  a 
characteristic  which  has  rarely  belonged  to  philosophers  in 
this  world,  and  yet  is  an  indispensiblo  requisite  in  the  char- 
acter of  a  Christian  Philosopher ;  and  as  there  is  a  phi- 
losophy of  tradition  as  well  as  of  inspiration,  and  a  support, 
in  some  quarters,  of  claims  that  derogate  from  and  conflict 
with  the  claims  of  the  Word  of  God ;  I  need  no  apology 
for  dwelling  at  some  length  on  this  subject.     The  admira- 


220  CHARACTERISTICS    OF  "^* 

ble  views  of  Dr.  Marsh  on  the  subject  of  a  scriptural  re- 
ligious education,  and  on  the  foundation  of  our  national 
well-being  and  stability  in  the  Bible,  I  shall  have  occasion 
separately  to  notice.  His  personal  regard  to  the  Word  of 
God,  and  his  views  of  its  evidence  and  authority,  are  what 
I  now  refer  to ;  and  if  I  am  not  mistaken,  they  embraced 
some  considerations  of  importance,  which  I  shall  for  a 
moment  dwell  upon. 

I  repeat,  then,  at  the  outset,  that  an  essential  character- 
istic of  a  Christian  Philosopher  is  the  reception  of  the 
Scriptures  as  the  Word  not  of  man  but  of  God.  I  use 
this  phraseology,  because  it  is  in  the  Scriptures  themselves, 
and  it  will  be  clearly  seen  how  much  is  meant  by  it.  There 
is  a  far  greater  dependence  of  the  philosophic  mind  for 
its  success,  for  the  pertinence,  soundness  and  acuteness 
of  its  speculations,  on  such  a  reception  of  the  Scriptures, 
with  a  corresponding  prayerful  study  of  them,  such  as  Dr. 
Marsh  was  accustomed  to,  than  is  generally  imagined. 
We  suspect  that  Lord  Bacon's  views  of  divine  inspiration 
were  the  source  of  not  a  little  of  his  great  wisdom ;  nor  is 
it  at  all  characteristic  of  a  strong  mind,  or  of  impartial  in- 
dependent thought,  either  to  cut  loose  from  the  Bible,  or 
to  hold  such  lax  views  of  its  inspiration,  as  to  make  it 
scarcely  more  binding  than  the  Koran. 

The  human  mind  in  relation  to  the  Word  of  God  is  like 
a  kite,  needing  to  be  confined,  in  order  that  it  may  steadily 
soar.  Not  even  the  Spirit  of  God  lifts  up  the  soul,  except 
as  it  is  confined  to  the  Scriptures.  If  a  mind,  in  the  vague 
aspirations  of  a  philosophic  freedom,  chafes  at  this  bondage, 
and  will  be  released,  then  it  happens  as  with  a  boy's  paper 
kite  in  the  air,  when  the  string  is  broken.  For  a  moment 
it  seemes  to  soar  more  loftily,  then  wavers  irregularly,  and 
plunges  headlong  to  the  earth.  Just  so,  a  mind  abandon- 
ing the  Word  of  God,  may  seem  for  a  season  to  be  sail- 
ing with  supreme  dominion  through  regions  of  original 
thought,  but  it  soon  wavers,  plunges,  and  falls. 


THE    CHRISTIAN    PHILOSOPHER.  221 

There  are  degrading  views  of  inspiration  as  unphilosophi- 
oal  and  almost  as  injurious  in  their  tendency,  as  its  entire 
rejection.  One  of  the  most  striking  instances  of  prejudice 
and  inconsistency  in  a  philosophic  mind,  is  to  be  found  in 
the  views  entertained  by  Mr.  Coleridge  in  regard  to  the 
Word  of  God;  views  which  would,  if  driven  closely,  be  as 
a  ploughshare  of  ruin  to  the  Christian  system,  or  else  would 
land  the  believer  in  a  pseudo-Romanism,  with  an  infaUible 
church  possessing  an  inspiration  denied  to  the  Scriptures, 
but  without  which,  in  themselves,  let  the  inspiration  of 
the  church  be  what  it  might,  the  Scriptures  would  be  of 
no  avail.  I  refer  to  the  publication  of  the  Confessions 
of  an  Enquiring  Spirit,  the  least  intellectual  and  the  most 
unphilosophical  of  all  his  productions.  The  true  subjective 
evidence  of  the  Word  of  God,  internal  in  the  scriptures, 
and  subjective  in  as,  is  opposed  to  three  false  schemes ;  the 
scheme  which  assumes  the  church  as  the  infallible  and  only 
interpreter  ;  the  scheme  in  philosophy,  which  would  reduce 
the  evidences  of  Christianity  to  mere  miracles  and  histor- 
ical testimony ;  and  the  scheme  which  supposes  in  man  a 
natural  spiritual  faith,  the  product  even  of  his  unregen- 
erate  state. 

In  speaking  of  the  grounds  of  our  faith  in  the  Word  of 
God,  and  of  the  nature  of  its  evidence  in  the  eye  of  a 
Christian  Philosopher,  we  begin  with  the  remembrance, 
that  the  divine  mind,  in  moving  upon  our  minds,  does  it 
ordinarily  through  the  affections.  In  no  other  way  is  faith 
in  us  practicable.  He  that  doeth  my  will  shall  know  of 
the  doctrine  whether  it  be  of  God.  A  right  state  of  the 
affections  is  essential  for  the  doing  of  God's  will,  is  a  part 
of  it ;  and  there  can  be  no  right  knowing,  no  real  faith, 
where  heavenly  affections  do  not  exist.  The  Spirit  of  God 
moves  the  mind  by  the  affections,  rather  than  the  affections 
by  the  mind.  The  Word  of  God  makes  its  appeal  to  the 
affections,  supposes  right  affections,  and  shows,  a  priori,^ 
the  necessity  of  them,  by  pre-supposing  them. 


222  CHARACTERISTICS    OF 

There  is  a  beautiful  analogy  in  nature.  On  a  bright 
day  in  summer,  while  the  west  wind  breathes  gently,  you 
stand  before  a  forest  of  maples,  or  you  are  attracted  by  a 
beautiful  tree  in  the  open  field,  that  seems  a  dense  clump 
of  foliage.  You  cannot  but  notice  how  easily  the  wind 
moves  it,  how  quietly,  how  gracefully,  how  lovingly,  the 
whole  body  of  it.  It  is  simply  because  it  is  covered  with 
foliage.  The  same  wind  rattling  through  its  dry  branches 
in  winter,  would  scarce  bend  a  bough,  or  only  to  break  it. 
But  now,  softly  whispering  through  ten  thousand  leaves, 
how  gently  the  whole  tree  yields  to  the  impression!  So  it 
is  with  the  affections,  the  feelings.  They  are  the  foliage 
of  our  being,  and  God's  own  Spirit  moves  our  mind,  our 
will,  by  our  affections. 

Hence  the  necessity  of  carefully  cherishing  and  culti- 
vating the  affections,  if  we  would  be  easily  moved  towards 
God,  and  susceptible  of  the  gentle  influences  of  His  Spirit. 
Nothing  can  supply  the  place  of  this  foliage.  A.nd  accord- 
ingly, if  it  have  fallen  off  through  early  neglect,  if  a  harsh 
and  unkind  education  have  nipped  it  in  the  bud,  if  parental 
tenderness  and  care  have  been  wanting,  so  that  either  no 
affections,  or  evil  ones,  have  place  in  the  being,  the  tree 
will  be  likely  to  remain  a  fruitless,  unsightly  incumbrance, 
of  which  God  in  due  time  will  say,  "Cut  it  down ;  why 
cumbereth  it  the  ground  ?"  The  more  green  leaves  a  man 
has  in  his  composition,  the  more  easily  will  the  breath  of 
God's  Spirit  move  him.  Accordingly  the  apostle,  speaking 
of  some  who  seemed  hardened  beyond  the  possibility  of  re- 
claiming, observes  that  they  were  without  natural  affec- 
tion. There  was  nothing  which  the  Spirit  of  God  might 
lay  hold  on  to  move  their  being. 

Now,  in  regard  to  the  word  of  God,  and  our  reception 
of  it,  our  faith  in  it,  our  experience  of  its  realities,  our 
knowledge  of  its  power ;  it  is  manifest  that  there  must  be 
right  affections  towards  God,  a  humble  and  tender  spirit 
and  frame  of  mind  and  heart.     If  there  be  no  such  affeo- 


THE    CHRISTIAN    PHILOSOPHER.  223 

tions  towards  God,  how  is  it  possible  that  there  should  be 
a  hearty  acknowledgment  of  his  word  ?  "  My  sheep  hear 
MY  VOICE  ;  but  a  stranger's  voice  will  they  not  hear."  It 
is  my  sheep  who  hear  ;  not  the  goats,  nor  the  wolves,  who 
are  not  expected  to  hear,  but  with  terror.  It  is  my  sheep, 
who  hear,  and  my  voice,  which  alone  they  will  hear,  which 
alone  is  divine. 

We  have  heard  the  evidence  of  the  Scriptures  likened  to 
that  with  which  a  child  knows  a  letter  from  its  father  ; 
but  it  must  be  a  child,  and  not  a  stranger,  a  child  ac- 
quainted with  its  father,  and  accustomed  to  communion 
with  him.  A  child  that  has  wandered  from  its  father's 
house  from  the  earliest  infancy,  and  disobeyed  its  parent, 
nor  ever  had  any  communion  with  him,  would  neither 
recognize  his  handwriting  nor  his  thoughts.  How  can 
there  be  internal  evidence,  where  there  is,  or  has  been,  no 
communion  of  spirit,  no  previous  acquaintance  ?  To  know 
that  this  is  a  letter  from  our  Heavenly  Father,  we  must 
be  the  children  of  our  Father  ;  our  affections  must  be 
warm  towards  him,  and  then  every  line  will  be  full  of  evi- 
dence, full  of  God.  Evil  men  understand  not  judgment, 
hut  they  that  seek  the  Lord  understand  all  things.  The 
difficulty  is  not  in  the  intellect,  but  in  the  heart ;  and  what 
is  needed  is  not  so  much  a  reasoning  intellect,  as  what  is  ^ 
called  in  Scripture  an  understanding  heart.  Fides  enim 
debet  precedere  intellectum,  ut  sit  intellectus  fidei  pre- 
mium. For  faith  must  precede  the  understandings  that 
a  full  understanding  may  be  the  reward  of  faith.  Faith 
being  an  exercise  of  the  heart,  these  words  of  Augustine 
are  right.  Mr.  Coleridge  even  applies  them  to  other  writ- 
ings besides  the  Scriptures.  If  now,  there  be  no  such 
affection  of  the  heart  towards  God,  towards  Christ,  how 
should  his  voice  be  recognized  ;  how  should  there  be  a 
heartfelt  and  intuitive  acknowledgment  of  his  word? 
Quantum  sumus  scimus.  So  much  as  we  are  we  know. 
How  deep  and  entire  a  truth  is  this  in  religion  I 


224 


CHARACTERISTICS    OF 


It  is  true,  indeed,  that  the  conscience  may  acknowledge 
the  threatenings  of  God's  Word,  without  the  heart ;  and 
for  this  purpose  the  prescriptive  belief  in  the  Bible  as  the 
Word  of  God,  that  belief  which  comes  with  our  education 
from  our  very  birth,  is  of  immeasurable  importance  and 
utility.  But  this  prescriptive  belief  is  very  different  from 
faith  ;  it  is  as  different  as  the  credence  of  human  testi- 
mony by  the  understanding,  and  of  divine  testimony  by 
the  heart.  The  will  can  never  be  submissive  to  the 
Word  of  God,  till  at  the  same  time  its  evidence  is  felt 
in  the  affections.  If  there  were  right  affections  towards 
God,  there  would  be  everywhere  an  instant  acknowledg- 
ment and  love  of  God's  Word,  just  as  a  child  knows  and 
loves  the  tones  of  its  father.  But  it  is  precisely  because 
of  the  want  of  these  right  affections  naturally,  that  such  a 
prescriptive  belief  is  of  so  great  importance.  Some  men 
are  prejudiced  against  the  prescriptive  belief,  against  build- 
ing upon  it  in  any  case,  until  the  mind  and  heart  adopt  it  on 
historical  proof  And  hence  the  external  evidences  of  Chris- 
tianity have  been  exalted  into  a  place  of  undue  authority. 

But  it  is  absurd  to  suppose  that  nothing  in  religion  is  to 
be  taught  by  prescription,  by  authority  ;  almost  everything 
that  we  learn  must  be  taught  in  this  way.  Our  first 
knowledge  of  science  demands  this  prescriptive  belief,  this 
believing  spirit.  And  will  you  deny  this  to  the  Word  of 
God  ?  You  teach  your  child  the  nature  of  electricity. 
You  point  it  to  the  lightning.  You  bring  your  child  to  the 
electrical  machine,  and  communicate  its  shock.  Your 
child's  knowledge  of  electricity  is  somewhat  different  after 
the  shock  from  what  it  was  before ;  but  would  it  be  philo- 
sophical to  refuse  all  belief  in  the  agency  and  power  of 
electricity  before  the  experience  of  that  shock  ?  You  take 
your  child  to  a  galvanic  apparatus,  and  show  him  the  same 
powerful  agent  burning  diamonds,  rocks,  metals ;  can  the 
child  understand  it  ?  How  does  he  know  that  it  is  not  all 
a  deception?     Shall  be  wait  till  he  can  prove  it  himself? 


THE    CHRISTIAN    PHILOSOPHER.  225 

Do  you  ever  dream  of  its  being  unphilosophioal  to  train  up 
your  child  in  a  belief  of  mysteries  in  nature,  which  he  can- 
not understand — which  he  cannot  yet  for  himself  demon- 
strate ?  Do  you  think  it  philosophy  to  keep  your  child  in 
ignorance  or  in  doubt,  or  to  teach  it  to  keep  its  faculties 
of  opinion  and  belief  inactive  in  regard  to  those  particulars, 
until  it  can  judge  solely  for  itself?  Nothing,  you  will  say, 
is  a  greater  absurdity.  Apply  then  the  same  reasoning  to 
the  Word  of  God. 

"  Have  you  children,*'  asks  Mr.  Coleridge,  "  or  have  you 
lived  among  children,  and  do  you  not  know  that  in  all  things, 
in  food,  in  medicine,  in  all  their  doings  and  abstainings, 
they  must  believe  in  order  to  acquire  a  reason  for  their  be- 
lief ?  But  so  it  is  with  religious  truths  for  all  men.  These 
we  must  all  learn  as  children.  The  ground  of  the  prevailing 
error  on  this  point  is  the  ignorance  that  in  spiritual  concern- 
ments to  believe  and  to  understand  are  not  diverse  things,  but 
the  same  thing  in  different  periods  of  its  growth.  Belief  is 
the  seed  received  into  the  will,  of  which  the  understanding  or 
knowledge  is  the  flower,  and  the  thing  believed  is  the  fruit." 

There  must  be  a  prejudice  in  favor  of  God ;  the  fact  that 
we  are  created  beings  makes  this  not  only  in  a  moral  point 
of  view  obligatory,  but  also,  in  an  intellectual  point  of  view, 
necessary  and  inevitable  ;  there  must  then,  of  course,  be  an 
atmosphere  of  belief,  without  which  the  proofs  themselves 
would  be  useless.  Is  it  necessary,  in  order  to  an  impartial 
judgment,  that  this  atmosphere  be  taken  away  from  the 
soul,  or  that  we  be  taken  out  of  it  ?  Would  you  require, 
in  order  to  an  impartial  criticism  on  the  Parthenon  or  the 
Temple  of  Theseus,  that  the  radiant  atmosphere  of  Greece 
should  be  destroyed,  and  the  fogs  of  England  be  made  to 
occupy  its  place ;  that  the  Parthenon  should  never  be  seen 
against  the  opal-colored  morning  on  Hymettus,  or  the  Tem- 
ple of  Theseus  in  the  rosy  light  of  an  Athenian  sunset  ? 
This  prejudice  in  favor  of  heavenly  things,  this  rosy  light 
of  a  prescriptive  belief  in  our  souls,  must  it  first  be  de- 


226  CHARACTERISTICS    OF 

stroyed  before  we  can  look  at  the  objects  of  faith  correctly  ? 
Where  the  affections  are  right,  faith  is  simply  the  intuition 
of  proof  seen  in  this  atmosphere. 

It  were  quite  as  philosophical  to  call  for  historical  proof 
of  the  Sun's  creation,  before  believing  in  the  light  of  the 
sun,  as  it  is  to  demand  historical  proof  of  the  Word  of  God, 
before  believing  in  the  light  of  that  Word.  Do  you  ask 
why  ?  Because,  the  Word  of  God  shines  by  an  intrinsic, 
self-evidencing  power,  to  an  inward  sense,  just  as  the  sun 
shines  by  a  self-evidencing  power  to  an  outward  sense.  But 
an  objector  may  say,  suppose  a  man  hands  to  me  the  book 
of  Mormon,\  affirming  that  to  be  the  Word  of  God  ;  would 
not -the^ same  rule  bind  me  to  believe  that?  We  answer 
not  at  all ;  it  would  bind  you  not  to  believe  it ;  for  the  self- 
evidence  in  that  case  is  the  self-evidence  of  a  lie,  the  intrin- 
sic color  of  falsehood.  But,  if  there  should  come  to  you 
another  book,  with  the  same  self-evidencing  power  of  divine 
truth  that  you  have  in  the  Word  of  God,  you  may  and 
must  receive  it  as  his  Word ;  for  nothing  will  have  that 
evidence  but  his  Word.  And  just  so,  if  another  sun  should 
be  lighted  up  in  God's  firmament,  you  must  receive  that  as 
God's  sun,  and  not  as  a  mock  luminary,  the  work  of  a  de- 
ceiver. Because,  nothing  but  a  revelation  from  God  ever 
will  or  ever  can  have  the  intrinsic  power  of  evidence  and 
authority  that  the  Word  of  God  has.  Everything  else  will 
speak  as  the  scribes,  and  having  the  stamp  and  authority 
of  the  scribes  merely,  you  are  not  bound  to  believe  it. 

You  can  bring  as  many  and  as  strong  arguments  against 
the  light  of  the  sun,  as  you  can  against  the  divine  light  of 
the  Scriptures.  In  one  view,  both  are  to  be  proved  by  the 
senses ;  in  another  view,  the  Bible  has  a  proof  beyond  and 
above  the  senses,  which  the  sun  has  not.  It  is  my  senses, 
which  bring  to  me  the  historical  proof  of  the  Scriptures. 
That  proof  demands  my  belief  on  external  testimony.  But 
this  alone  could  never  convince  me ;  this  is  not  all  my 
proof  for  the  Word  of  God,  but  the  least  part  of  it ;  it  is 


THE    CHRISTIAN    PHILOSOPHER.  227 

merely  an  adjunct;  it  is  not  even  necessary.  In  the  .Word 
of  God  itself  I  have  an  independent  ground  of  conviction, 
and  a  temple  of  faith  by  the  Spirit  of  God  in  my  soul,  of 
which  my  senses  indeed,  in  tlie  conveyance  of  paper,  ink, 
and  printer's  types,  bring  in  the  materials,  and  build  up 
the  scaffolding,  but  which  arises  in  my  soul  entirely  distinct 
and  apart  from  sense  and  historical  testimony.  The  his- 
torical scaffolding  may  be  taken  down,  and  the  way  in 
which  the  stones  of  the  temple  in  my  soul  came  into  their 
place  may  have  passed  from  human  knowledge,  but  the 
temple  stands  as  firm  and  real,  notwithstanding.  The  way 
in  which  the  key-stone  was  put  in  may  have  perished,  but 
the  arch  is  not  on  that  account  the  less  strong,  upspringing, 
and  expanding. 

On  the  other  hand,  it  is  my-  senses  that  bring  to  me  all 
the  proof  of  the  sun's  existence ;  for  there  is  no  sun  within 
me  as  a  counterpart,  no  reality  in  my  soul  to  answer  to  the 
archetype  without.  I  have  therefore  more  and  higher  proof 
of  God's  Word,  and  that  it  is  his  Word,  than  I  have  of  the 
sun.  The  sun  may  be  a  deception,  or  a  creation  of  my 
own  sense  merely,  or  if  not,  it  may  be  the  work  of  a  great 
demon.  But  this  Word  is  not  my  creation,  and  it  could 
not  be  the  work  of  an  enemy,  and  it  surpasses  the  power 
of  my  race. 

But  there  is  a  higher  evidence  still.  What  evidence 
have  you  that  I  am  speaking  ?  You  hear  my  voice,  you 
see  my  person.  Do  you  need  other  demonstration?  No, 
you  will  say  ;  but  so  soon  as  I  cease  to  speak,  what  evi- 
dence can  you  give  to  another  that  I  have  been  speaking  ? 
None  but  that  of  testimony.  If  you  had  my  words  to 
show  to  another,  this  would  be  no  evidence  beyond  your 
own  testimony  that  I  had  been  speaking,  that  I  uttered 
those  words.  It  would  still  be  your  own  mere  testimony. 
This  is  the  very  ground,  so  low,  so  untenable,  on  which  the 
argument  for  the  Word  of  God  is  rested  by  many  minds. 
But,  one  thing  is  ommitted.    God  is  still  speaking.    What 


228  CHARACTERISTICS    OF 

evidence  had  the  inspired  writers  that  God  was  speaking  ? 
They  heard  his  voice,  they  saw  his  glory,  they  felt  his 
presence.  They  heard  sometimes  audibly,  sometimes  in- 
wardly, sometimes  with  what  are  called  miraculous  demon- 
strations, sometimes  without.  But  if  God  ceased  to  speak, 
what  evidence  could  those  who  thus  heard  him  give  to  an- 
other that  he  had  been  speaking?  We  answer,  if  God 
ceased  to  speak,  none  but  that  of  testimony,  mere  human 
testimony.  Even  if  they  had  God's  words  to  show,  still 
there  would  be  no  evidence  beyond  their  own  testimony, 
that  God  had  spoken  them.  It  would  be  mere  human  tes- 
timony. They  to  whom  that  word  was  spoken  by  God,  they 
for  whom  it  was  intended,  would  feel  its  evidence,  and  would 
be  compelled  to  acknowledge  it  as  from  God  ;  but  others, 
to  whom  it  was  merely  shown  by  those  to  whom  it  came, 
would  not  feel  its  evidence,  would  not  be  compelled  to  ac- 
knowledge it  as  from  God.  To  all  for  whom  the  Word  of 
God  was  intended,  the  Word  of  God  speaks,  God  himself 
speaks  ;  and  if  they  do  not  recognize  the  divine  voice,  it  is 
because  of  moral  evil  in  themselves ;  it  is  because  they  are 
goats  or  wolves,  and  not  sheep.  But  even  in  them  the 
conscience  may  respond  to  the  divine  voice,  though  the  heart 
may  refuse  to  recognize  it. 

The  point  then  is  this  :  If  God  does  not  still  speak,  there 
is  no  suitable  evidence  that  he  has  spoken.  He  must  speak 
to  you  and  to  me,  as  well  as  to  the  prophets  and  apos- 
tles, or  it  is  mere  human  testimony.  He  does  thus  speak ; 
and  now  if  you  ask.  What  evidence  have  you  that  God  is 
speaking  ?  the  answer  is.  We  hear  his  voice,  we  feel  his 
presence,  we  know  his  Spirit.  This  is  the  point.  My 
sheep  hear  my  voice.  The  Word  of  God  is  never  without 
the  Spirit  of  God,  and  never  ceases  to  sound.  It  speaks  as 
audibly  now,  and  as  directly  to  you  and  to  me,  as  to  the 
prophets.  This  is  the  meaning  of  that  declaration,  the  Word 
of  God  liveth  and  abideth  forever.  It  is  a  continuous, 
imperishable,  personal  utterance,  not  dependent  for  its  au- 


THE    CHRISTIAN    PHILOSOPHER.  229 

thenticity  upon  human  witnesses,  but  making  itself  felt  in 
the  soul,  having  its  witnesses  there.  It  had  its  witnesses 
in  the  soul  in  the  case  of  the  prophets ;  if  it  had  not  had 
them,  all  miracles  would  have  been  of  no  avail,  would  have 
produced  no  conviction.  And  just  so  now,  if  there  be  not 
these  witnesses  within,  all  external  testimony  will  be  of  no 
avail,  not  even  miracles  now  enacted.  The  word  preached 
did  not  profit  them,  not  being  mixed  with  faith  in  them 
that  heard  it. 

What  then  is  the  only  admissible  and  irresistible  witness 
to  the  Word  of  God  ?  It  is  the  witness  of  his  Spirit. 
And  therefore  Archbishop  Usher,  at  the  close  of  his  very 
powerful  array  of  the  reasons,  which  prove  that  God  is  the 
author  of  the  Holy  Scriptures,  puts  the  question.  Are  these 
motives  of  themselves  sufficient  to  work  saving  faith,  and 
persuade  us  fully  to  rest  in  God's  word  ?  and  answers.  No. 
''  Besides  all  these  it  is  required  that  we  have  the  Spirit  of 
God,  as  well  to  open  our  eyes  to  see  the  light,  as  to  seal  up 
fully  unto  our  hearts  that  truth,  which  we  see  with  our 
eyes.  For  the  same  Holy  Spirit,  that  inspired  the  Scrip- 
tures, inclineth  the  hearts  of  God's  children  to  believe  what 
is  revealed  in  them,  and  inwardly  assureth  them  above  all 
reasons  and  arguments,  that  these  are  the  Scriptures  of 
God.  Therefore  the  Lord,  by  the  prophet  Isaiah,  promiseth 
to  join  his  Spirit  with  his  Word,  and  that  it  shall  remain 
with  his  children  forever.  And  so  in  other  promises.  This 
testimony  of  God's  Spirit  in  the  hearts  of  his  faithful,  as  it 
is  peculiar  to  the  Word  of  God,  so  it  is  greater  than  any 
human  persuasions  grounded  upon  reason  or  witnesses  of 
men  ;  unto  ivhich  it  is  unmeet  that  the  Word  of  God  should 
be  subject,  as  papists  hold  when  they  teach  that  the  Scrip- 
tures receive  their  authority  from  the  church.  For  by 
thus  hanging  the  credit  and  authority  of  the  Scriptures 
on  the  churches  sentence,  they  make  the  churcWs  word  of 
greater  credit  than  the  Word  of  God.  Whereas  the  Scrip- 
tures of  God  cannot  be  judged  or  sentenced  by  any ;  and 


230  CHARACTERISTICS    OF 

God  only  is  a  worthy  witness  of  himself,  in  his  Word  and 
by  his  Spirit,  which  give  mutual  testimony  one  of  the  other, 
and  work  that  assurance  of  faith  in  his  children,  that  no 
human  demonstrations  can  make,  nor  any  persuasions  or 
enforcements  of  the  world  can  remove." 

This  is  a  noble  passage  ;  nor  have  we  ever  seen  the 
reasons  of  Faith  in  the  Scriptures  as  the  Word  of  God  more 
powerfully  set  forth,  and  set  far  above  all  historical  pro  vers 
and  church-dependants  on  the  one  side,  and  all  transcen- 
dental independents  on  the  other,  than  in  the  vigorous  and 
Christian  logic  of  Usher  and  Halyburton. 

Then,  perhaps  you  will  ask,  is  external  testimony  of  no 
avail  ?  We  answer.  Much  every  way.  And  the  power  of 
a  prescriptive  belief  in  the  Word  of  God  will  be  growing 
stronger  and  stronger  with  the  increase  of  this  testimony, 
in  the  increase  of  the  multitudes,  who  are  brought  to  the 
experience  of  the  power  of  God's  Word,  and  to  the  exer- 
cise of  this  higher,  appropriating  personal  faith.  And 
herein  is  the  power,  the  spirituality,  the  efficacy  of  different 
churches  tested,  just  in  proportion  to  the  simplicity  and 
purity  of  their  reliance  on  the  Word  of  God,  their  profound 
unshaken  conviction  and  belief  of  its  infallible  inspiration, 
and  their  acting  accordingly.  If  any  church  dares  give 
to  its  own  word  and  ordinances  an  infallibility  which  it 
denies  to  the  Word  of  God,  it  must  inevitably  become 
weak,  corrupt,  ambitious.  If  any  church  thus  dares  come 
between  the  Word  of  God  and  the  soui,  it  is  the  betrayer, 
instead  of  the  keeper  of  its  trust,  it  injures  instead  of  helps 
the  believer ;  it  is  as  a  dreaming  mother,  who  overlays  and 
suffocates  her  own  children.  But  just  in  proportion  to  the 
simple,  unadulterated,  untraditionary  faith,  with  which  any 
church  receives  and  lives  upon  God's  Word,  will  be  the  in- 
crease, by  the  instrumentality  of  that  church,  of  the  power 
of  external  testimony  to  the  world  ;  for  multitudes  of  men 
will  be  converted — converted  not  to  the  church,  but  to  God  ; 


THE    CHRISTIAN    PHILOSOPHER.  231 

and  every  new  convert  by  God's  Word  is  a  new  witness  of 
the  divinity  of  that  Word. 

The  testimony  of  the  church  of  God  concerning  the 
Word  of  God,  and  not  concerning  herself,  is  great,  is 
mighty.  It  is  the  testimony  of  the  Word  and  Spirit  of 
God,  in  and  through  the  church,  by  its  participation  in  the 
divine  nature,  its  manifestation  of  the  divine  holiness.  But 
then,  if  it  were  all  annihilated,  the  Word  of  God,  in  its 
simple  majesty,  would  have  just  as  much  power  to  all  to 
whom  it  speaks,  falling  like  a  cataract  into  the  depths  of 
the  soul.  A  man  who  has  never  heard  of  the  cataract  of 
Niagara,  would  be  just  as  much  overwhelmed  by  it,  if  he 
came  upon  it  in  the  wilderness,  as  if  he  had  heard  the 
voice  of  nations  testifying  to  its  sublimity.  Just  so  it  is 
with  the  Scriptures.  Their  external  testimony,  as  Mr. 
Berridge  used  to  say  of  learning,  is  a  good  stone  to  throw 
at  a  dog  to  stop  his  barking.  It  is  good  to  meet  the  objec- 
tions of  infidels,  good  to  show  that  no  counterproof  can  be 
brought  against  your  argument ;  good  also  for  the  mind  to 
fall  back  upon  in  times  when  the  spiritual  vision  is  dark, 
the  soul  clouded,  and  only  the  earthly  understanding  wake- 
ful. But  after  all  if  the  Word  of  God  is  living,  abiding, 
speaking,  whenever  and  however  it  comes,  it  comes  with 
DIVINE  AUTHORITY,  and  uccds  no  attendant  to  usher  it  in,  no 
herald  to  demonstrate  its  dignity. 

This  view  of  the  self-evidence  and  divine  authority  of 
the  Scriptures,  so  fundamental  in  a  true  philosophy,  and 
yet  such  a  stranger  to  philosophy  in  general,  is  that,  to 
which  Dr.  Marsh's  philosophical  investigations  would  di- 
rectly lead ;  that  in  which  he  himself,  w^e  believe,  as  a 
Christian  Philosopher,  delighted.  He  insisted  much  on  the 
necessity  of  studying  the  Word  of  God  with  an  humble 
and  believing  spirit.  And  for  the  right  interpretation  of 
Scripture,  he  insisted  not  merely  on  the  guidance  of  cor- 
rect critical  rules,  but  on  the  light  shed  by  the  experience, 


232  CHARACTERISTICS    OF 

within  our  own  souls,  through  the  indwelling  Holy  Spirit, 
of  what  God  has  revealed  in  his  Word ;  there  being  ''  no 
light  which  can  guide  us  to  a  right  and  full  understanding 
of  the  Scriptures,  except  that  which  first  shines  in  our  own 
heart."  "  Wherever,"  says  he,  "  the  subject  treated  of  is 
of  a  spiritual  nature,  we  must  have  in  addition  to  all  these 
outward  helps,  the  exercise  and  development  of  the  cor- 
responding spiritual  acts  and  affections  in  our  own  con- 
sciousness. How  is  it  possible,  otherwise,  for  us  to  under- 
stand the  words,  or  to  refer  them  to  the  things  designated  ? 
We  may  have  a  notion  of  their  effects  and  relations  ;  but 
the  words,  in  this  case,  mean  more  than  these ;  and  more 
must  be  known,  before  the  meaning  of  the  writer  can  be 
fully  apprehended.  We  must  sit  at  the  feet  of  our  Divine 
Master,  and  learn  of  him,  and  obey  his  commands,  before 
we  can  know  of  his  doctrine,  before  we  can  fully  under- 
stand or  believe  in  the  name  of  Jesus." 

The  faith  of  which  I  have  spoken  is,  it  will  be  seen,  very 
different  from  a  mere  belief  in  the  truth ;  it  is  belief  in 
God,  the  resting  of  the  soul  on  that  affirmation.  Thus  saith 
the  Lord.  This  separates  it  from  that  belief  in  Christianity, 
of  which  some  men  and  sects  make  so  great  a  parade  under 
the  profession  of  a  pure  and  lofty  regard  for  truth.  They 
say,  we  receive  the  Word  of  God,  because  it  is  true ;  on 
this  assumption,  they  take  whatever  they  choose  in  and 
from  it,  which  suits  their  views  of  truth  ;  on  this  assump- 
tion also  they  say  they  will  receive  the  Word  of  God,  so 
far  as  it  is  true.  They  acknowledge  the  "divine  origin 
of  the  religion  of  Christ,  and  its  adaptation  to  be  the  faith  of 
the  world,  when  presented  in  a  form  corresponding  with  its 
inherent  spirit,  and  with  the  scientific  culture  of  the  present 
age."  They  say  that  ''  while  other  teachers  have  commit- 
ted their  wisdom  to  writing,  Jesus  Christ  confided  in  the 
divine  energy  of  his  doctrine,  lest,  being  entrusted  to  words, 
which   are  but  breath,   it  should  be  dispersed  and  lost." 


THE    CHRISTIAN    PHILOSOPHER.  233    ' 

These  men  talk  of  a  divine  inspiration,  but  will  not  receive 
it  anywhere  in  set  words.  For  them  there  is  no  word  of 
God ;  It  is  too  narrow  a  confinement  of  their  soaring  faith 
to  tie  it  to  a  form  of  words,  to  restrict  it  to  a  volume  ;  as  if, 
forsooth,  that  which  is  but  the  temporary  record  of  one  mode 
of  divine  inspiration,  should  bind  heart  and  soul  to  its  dic- 
tates. They  believe  in  the  truth,  and  not  in  such  an  inspi- 
ration. Their  search  for  truth  seems  to  them  much  more 
grand  and  lofty  than  any  mere  searching  for  the  truth  as 
it  is  in  Jesus. 

But  this  is  not  God's  view ;  this  is  not  Christian  philo- 
sophy. It  was  never  the  direction  of  our  blessed  Lord  him- 
self in  matters  of  religion  to  search  the  truth,  but  to  search 
the  Scriptures.  There  is  much  pretended  philosophical 
seeking  for  the  truth,  combined  with  a  denial  of  the  Scrip- 
tures ;  just  as  there  is  much  pretended  seeking  for  life, 
combined  with  unbelief  in,  and  a  denial  of.  Him,  who  is  the 
Way,  the  Truth,  and  the  Life.  God  has  given  to  us  eter- 
nal life,  and  this  life  is  in  his  Son,  and  in  his  Word  as  it 
reveals  his  Son.  God  has  given  to  us  eternal  truth,  and 
this  truth  is  in  his  Son,  and  in  his  Word  as  it  reveals  his 
Son.  The  whole  mass  of  general  believers,  but  particuTa,r 
infidels,  receive  the  first  part  of  both  these  propositions,  but  N 
reject  the  last.  Philosophy,  in  their  view,  is  larger  than 
faith,  and  cannot,  like  faith,  be  confined  to  a  record. 

This  I  apprehend  to  be  one  of  the  characteristics  of  that 
spurious  philosophy,  which,  by  a  strange  misnomer,  has  so' 
appropriated  the  term  transcendentalism  to  itself,  that  it  is 
now  almost  a  hopeless  task  to  recall  this  abused  name  to  its 
real  meaning.  It  has  had  a  philosophical  meaning,  accurate, 
important,  and  not  invidious.  This  meaning  is  admirably 
conveyed  in  the  following  passage  from  Mr.  Coleridge's  Bi- 
ographia  Literaria  :  ''  There  is  a  philosophic  (and  inasmuch 
as  it  is  actualized  by  an  effect  of  freedom  an  artificial)  con- 
sciousness, which  lies  beneath,  or  as  it  were  behind  the 
spontaneous  consciousness  natural  to  all  reflecting  beings. 


234  CHARACTERISTICS    OF 

As  the  elder  Romans  distinguished  their  northern  provinces 
into  Cis-alpine  and  Trans-alpine,  so  may  we  divide  all  the 
objects  of  human  knowledge  into  those  on  this  side,  and 
those  on  the  other  side  of  the  spontaneous  consciousness ; 
citra  et  trans  conscientiam  communem.  The  latter  is  ex- 
clusively the  domain  of  pure  philosophy,  M^hich  is  therefore 
properly  entitled  transcendental,  in  order  to  discriminate  it 
at  once  both  from  mere  reflection  and  representation  on  the 
one  hand,  and  on  the  other  from  those  flights  of  lawless 
speculation,  which,  abandoned  by  all  distinct  consciousness, 
because  transgressing  the  bounds  and  purposes  of  our  in- 
tellectual faculties,  are  justly  condemned  as  transcendents 
Now  the  term  transcendental,  the  old  philosophical  term, 
has  been  stolen  from  this,  its  proper  acceptation,  and  ap- 
plied to  those  flights  of  lawless  speculation,  thus  severely 
characterized  by  Mr.  Coleridge.  Transcendentalism,  then, 
has  come  to  mean,  if  defined  by  the  system  of  many  who 
assume  it,  that  which  transcends  and  casts  off"  the  letter 
and  the  word,  as  that  which  killeth,  and  rises  into  the  spirit 
alone,  as  that  which  maketh  alive.  This  philosophic  unbe- 
lief dwells  much,  of  late  days,  on  the  internal  evidences  of 
Christianity  ;  but  it  is  the  evidence  of  general  truths  taken 
from  the  Scriptures,  while  the  Scriptures  themselves  are 
cast  aside  as  not  necessarily  a  part  of  Christianity,  not  an 
essential  and  inseparable  embodiment  of  it,  without  which 
it  would  cease  soon  to  have  an  existence.  Here  this  trans- 
cendentalism is  that  which,  having  received  the  inflation  of 
those  sublime  ideas  entrusted  by  the  Saviour  to  their  own 
energy,  transcends  or  rises  superior  to  the  temporary  record 
of  them.  As  a  butterfly  soars  from  its  chrysalis,  or  as  a 
balloon,  cut  loose  from  the  point  at  which  it  was  inflated, 
wings  its  independent  way  through  space,  so  the  soul  of 
the  transcendentalist,  having  breathed  the  breath  of  life, 
soars  into  the  pure  empyrean,  where  truth  is  not  confined 
to  particular  demonstration,  and  where  Christianity  is  too 
large  and  magnificent  to  need  an  appeal  to  the  records  of 


THE    CHRISTIAN    PHILOSOPHER.  235 

the  Old  and  New  Testaments.  This  would  be  like  a  but- 
terfly returning  into  its  chrysalis.  Now  the  consequence 
of  such  a  career  is  inevitable.  This  departure  from  divine 
truth  leaves  both  the  soul  and  its  literature,  the  transcen- 
dentalist  and  his  forth-puttings,  first  to  a  magnificent  but 
superficial  religious  sentimentalism,  and  next  to  open  Deism  ' 
or  concealed  Pantheism,  with  a  stale,  sickening  redecoction 
of  the  originalities  of  the  strong-minded  infidelity  of  a  former 
age. 

The  denial  of  the  Scriptures  as  the  word  of  God,  by 
which  we  mean  the  denial  of  their  infallible  inspiration, 
leads  to  two  opposite  extremes  ;  infidelity  on  the  one  side, 
and  a  bondage  to  the  church  on  the  other.  If  it  be  not  to 
us  as  individuals  that  the  Scriptures  speak,  and  with  all 
the  self-evidence  which  they  need,  then  an  infallible  church 
is  the  necessary  result,  in  order  to  secure  the  true  interpre- 
tation of  the  Scriptures,  and  to  supply  their  lack  of  au- 
thority. The  only  protection  alike  from  the  license  of 
infidelity  on  the  one  side,  and  the  despotism  of  ecclesiastical 
bigotry  on  the  other,  is  to  be  found  in  the  reception  of  the 
Word  of  God  as  his  Word  and  not  man's,  as  his  Word 
speaking  to  each  individual  soul,  and  by  each  individual 
soul  to  be  received,  obeyed,  and  lived  upon.  This  is  true 
independence,  righteousness  and  power  ;  this  the  stability 
of  a  good  education  ;  this  shall  be  the  glory  of  this  Northern 
University,  consecrated  as  one  of  the  dwelling-places  of 
God's  holy  light  and  truth.  "  May  those  who  teach,"  said 
Dr.  Marsh,  "and  those  who  learn,  in  this  institution,  re- 
ceive with  meekness  the  ingrafted  word,  and  be  all  taught 
of  God." 

The  license  of  infidelity  without  the  Word,  many  take 
the  profession  of  a  faith  and  a  religion,  higher,  holier, 
freer,  than  can  possibly  be  founded  on  a  form  of  words ; 
and  even  Pantheism  itself  may  be  represented  as  the  sab- 
lime  yearnings  of  the  soul,  rising  above  its  personal  self, 
to  be  absorbed  and  lost  in  God,  the  universal  all  in  all 


236  CHARACTERISTICS    OF 

This  mere  intellectual  sublimated  sentimentalism  is  but  an 
Indian  Oriental  Mysticism,  reproduced  under  the  light  of 
Christianity.  At  an  earlier  period  its  admirers  would 
have  been  the  Gnostics,  as  they  are  now  the  transcen- 
dentalists  of  Christian  society.  Doubtless  there  is  this 
natural  intellectual  yearning  after  God,  even  when  the 
heart  is  at  enmity  against  him.  Expressed  in  the  contem- 
plations of  any  man  of  high  intellect,  it  will  often  look 
like  the  unutterable,  illimitable  yearnings  of  a  deep,  mys- 
tic, holy  piety.  There  is  such  a  reflection  of  God  in  the 
soul.  But  it  is  without  life,  or  if  life  circulates  in  it,  being 
only  the  life  of  nature,  it  disturbs  it.  It  is  like  the  reflec- 
tion of  the  sky  and  the  trees  in  a  quiet  lake.  Let  it  rest 
in  perfect  stillness,  and  you  would  think  that  heaven  itself 
were  there.  But  let  the  wind  sweep  over  it,  or  a  storm 
agitate  it. 

Or  if  a  stone  the  smooth  expanse  divide, 
Swift  ruffling  circles  curl  on  every  side. 

So  let  the  winds  of  passion  rise,  and  this  intellectual  reflec- 
tion of  the  image  of  God  and  divine  things  is  dispersed 
and  broken  in  ten  thousand  fragments. 

The  calmness  and  beauty  of  this  intellectual  abstraction 
are  often  taken  for  religion  itself,  so  that  Spinosa  has  been 
regarded  as  one  of  the  most  pious  of  mankind.  His 
writings  have  been  likened  to  those  of  Thomas  a  Kempis ! 
He  was  not,  perhaps,  so  justly  to  be  called  an  Atheist,  as 
an  Aktismatist,  or  an  Aktisist ;  for  he  denied  a  creature 
rather  than  a  God ;  "  but  his  scheme,"  said  John  Howe, 
in  his  Living  Temple,  "  though  he  and  his  followers  would 
cheat  the  world  with  names,  and  with  a  specious  show  of 
piety,  is  as  directly  levelled*  against  all  religion,  as  any 
the  most  avowed  Atheism ;  for  as  to  religion,  it  is  all  one 
whether  we  make  nothing  to  be  God,  or  everything ;  whether 
we  allow  of  no  God  to  worship,  or  leave  none  to  worship 
him."     In  this  transcendental  scheme   there  are  no  two 


THE    CHRISTIAN    PHILOSOPHER.  237 

things  more  similar  than  Pantheism  and  Piety :  absorption 
in  Godj  self-renunciation,  self-annihilation,  union  with  the 
Infinite,  and  other  things  talked  of,  being  marvellously 
similar  to  the  self-denial  and  self-crucifixion  for  Christ's 
sake,  recommended  in  the  Scriptures.  ''  The  scheme  of 
Spinosa,"  said  Howe,  ''  though  with  great  pretence  of  devo- 
tion it  acknowledges  a  Deity,  yet  so  confounds  this  his 
fictitious  Deity  with  every  substantial  being  in  the  world 
besides,  that  upon  the  whole  it  appears  altogether  incon- 
sistent with  any  rational  exercise  or  sentiment  of  religion 
at  all."  Just  so,  this  transcendental  devotion,  which 
absorbs  us  in  the  universe,  and  makes  religion  to  consist  in 
the  rapt  adoration  of  the  God  of  Pantheism,  is  quite  in- 
consistent with  a  personal  discipline  of  the  affections  in  the 
worship  of  a  personal  God  under  guidance  of  the  Scrip- 
tures. To  lay  one's  being  at  the  foot  of  the  cross,  to 
mortify  and  subject  the  self-will  to  God  in  Christ,  is  widely 
different  from  this  vague,  mystical  absorption  of  the  being 
in  an  ideal  God,  in  a  universal  influence.  And  so  the 
search  for  truth,  and  the  love  of  it,  under  the  forms  laid 
down  in  the  Scriptures,  are  very  different  from  the  philo- 
sophical search,  like  the  Greeks,  for  wisdom ;  a  passion,  in 
which  there  is  at  least  as  much  pride  as  disinterestedness. 
In  fine,  in  the  words  of  the  holy  Archbishop  Leigh  ton,  ''If 
any  pretend  that  they  have  the  Spirit,  and  so  turn  away 
from  the  strait  rule  of  the  Holy  Scriptures,  they  have  a 
spirit  indeed,  but  it  is  a  fanatical  spirit,  a  spirit  of  delusion 
and  giddiness :  but  the  Spirit  of  God,  that  leads  his  chil- 
dren in  the  way  of  truth,  and  is  for  that  purpose  sent  them 
from  heaven  to  guide  them  thither,  squares  their  thoughts 
and  ways  to  that  rule  whereof  it  is  the  author,  and  that 
Word,  which  was  inspired  by  it,  and  sanctifies  them  to 
obedience." 

VI.  A  Christian  Philosopher  has  much  to  do  with  Chris- 
tian Theology  ;  but  it  is  as  a  learner  rather  than  a  critic  ; 


238  CHARACTERISTICS    OF 

for  without  doubt  philosophy  should  always  stand  and 
serve,  as  a  modest  handmaid  to  Theology,  and  not  as  a 
superior  judge.  By  Christian  Theology  we  mean  what 
Zuingle  has  called  "  God's  thoughts  in  his  own  Word ;"  and 
in  a  system  of  Theology  it  will  be  characteristic  of  the 
Christian  Philosopher  to  fix  his  starting  point,  and  his  last 
tribunal,  in  the  Scriptures,  and  to  bring  his  investigations 
thither  for  the  determination  of  their  truth.  If  change 
and  accommodation  must  be  made,  it  is  his  business  rather 
to  accommodate  his  views  to  the  Bible,  than  the  Bible  to 
his  views.  Deplorable  have  been  the  results  of  using  a 
philosophy,  or  a  theological  system  framed  for  it,  as  the 
veil,  medium,  or  atmosphere  of  divine  truth.     "  Philosophy 

/  and    theology,"    said   Zuiogle,    "  were    constantly  raising 
^  /  difficulties  in  my  mind.     At  length  I  was  brought  to  say, 

\   "We  must  leave  these  things,  and  endeavor  to  enter  into 

^Ood's  thoughts  in  his  own  Word." 

But  what  can  the  philosophy  and  theology  be  made  of, 
which  are  constantly  raising  difficulties,  instead  of  reveal- 
^  ing  truth?  Human  speculations,  prejudices,  and  fancies 
of  opinion ; — these,  marched  before  the  Bible  as  its  van- 
guard, instead  of  being  in  their  place,  as  the  rabble  of 
camp-followers,  have  done  immeasurable  mischief  Divine 
truth,  behind  such  a  medium,  is  as  the  sun  in  an  eclipse, 
creating  a  dim  disastrous  twilight.  Many  a  mind,  before 
it  found  rest  in  God's  "Work,  has  had  to  run  the  gauntlet, 
a  long  and  perilous  way,  through  the  false  philosophy  in 
which  it  had  been  educated.  Need  I  mention  me  Sensu- 
ous systerri,  against  which,  with  its  dreadful  irons  for  the 
mind,  and  its  rigid  necessitarian  frame-work  for  theology, 
Dr.  Marsh  was,  in  this  country,  one  of  the  earliest,  firmest, 
profoundest  opposers  ? 

"Common  sense  would  teach  us,"  says  he,  in  speaking 
of  a  S3^stem  of  education  to  be  founded  on  God's  Word, 
"  that  we  cannot  with  propriety  combine,  in  one  system 
of  instruction,  the   truths   and  principles  of  the   Divine 


THE    CHRISTIAN    PHILOSOPHER.  239 

Word,  and  other  principles  and  influences  of  contrary 
tendency.  Our  powers  of  intelligence  are  not  only  without 
contradiction  in  their  relation  to  each  other,  but  they  instinct- 
ively tend,  under  the  control  of  reason,  to  systematize  and 
reduce  to  consistent  and  harmonious  principles,  the  whole  • 
complex  body  of  our  knowledge.  Do  not  the  interests  of 
education,  as  well  as  those  of  religion,  require  that  we 
teach  nothing  incompatible  with  those  great  truths  and 
principles  of  the  Divine  Word,  which  are  themselves  fitted 
to  seize  with  such  power  upon  the  mind.  Especially 
should  all  appearance  of  contradiction  be  avoided  here,  in 
that  stage  of  an  education,  when  the  mind  is  becoming 
more  distinctly  conscious  of  its  own  energies,  and  of  the 
grounds  of  truth  in  its  own  being." 

If  a  man's  philosophical  system  be  such  an  one  as  de- 
stroys the  possibility  of  human  freedom,  and  if  he  forms 
his  theology  into  a  system  under  its  influence,  this  is  not 
to  act  the  part  of  a  Christian  Philosopher.  If  a  man's 
philosophical  system  be  one  that  rejects  the  atonement,  and 
in  the  light  of  that  system  he  comes  to  the  Bible,  seeking 
singly  to  warp  its  passages  to  his  negative  side,  and  to 
turn  its  strong  affirmations  into  a  tissue  of  lying  metaphors, 
he  can  in  no  sense  be  called  a  Christian  Philosopher.  And 
if  his  philosophical  system  be  one  that  admits  the  atone- 
ment, but  seeks  philosophically  to  account  for  it,  and  in  so 
doing  takes  only  its  subjective  aspect  in  relation  to  our- 
selves, disposing  of  all  passages,  whether  in  reference  to 
God  or  man,  in  that  relation  only,  this,  too,  is  not  the 
course  of  a  Christian  Philosopher.  In  this  view,  the  system 
of  Mr.  Coleridge,  if  system  it  can  be  called,  to  which  that 
great  and  learned  man  never  gave  form  and  unity,  lies 
open  to  severe  remark,  in  reference  to  all  that  he  has  said  on 
the  doctrine  of  atonement.  On  this  subject  he  seems  to  have 
deserted  his  wonted  candor,  and  to  have  become  a  special 
pleader.  Disposing  of  almost  the  entire  language  of  the 
scriptures  on  this  subject  as  metaphorical,  he  has,  in  effect, 


240  CHARACTERISTICS    OF 

resolved  the  atonement  into  a  mere  business  of  regeneration 
— a  mere  arrangement  of  means  and  ends  for  our  personal 
sanctification.  We  may,  with  great  probability,  suppose 
that  this  was  the  result  of  Mr.  Coleridge's  early  religious 
errors  ;  _  one  consequence  of  the  cold  and  deadly  baptism  of 
his  soul  in  the  Unitarian  scheme,  though  he  afterwards 
shuddered  at  its  recollection,  was  an  inability  or  unwilling- 
ness to  contemplate  the  higher  ends  of  the  atonement,  and 
its  higher  nature,  as  revealed  in  the  Scriptures.  It  is  a 
great  and  most  unphilosophical  confusion,  to  mingle  and 
interchange  what  Christ  is  in  and  of  himself  as  the  regen- 
eration and  life  of  our  souls,  with  the  great  doctrine  of  the 
atonement  revealing  him,  in  his  death,  as  the  sacrifice  for 
our  sins ;  what  Christ  is  when  formed  in  us  the  hope  of 
glory,  the  inward  fountain  of  salvation,  and  what  his 
atoning  sacrifice  is  in  providing  for  the  world  the  possibility 
of  such  regeneration ; — confounding,  in  fine,  the  regenera- 
ting work  of  the  Spirit  with  the  sacrificial  work  of  the 
Redeemer. 

A  mind  so  clear,  profound  and  evangelical  as  Dr.  Marsh's 
could  never  have  been  satisfied  with  such  confusion.  This 
is  as  unphilosophical  as  if,  in  explaining  the  solar  system, 
an  astronomer  should  confound  the  influence  of  light,  by 
which  our  earth  becomes  the  green  and  beautiful  abode  of 
man,  with  the  power  of  gravitation,  by  which  it  is  held  in 
the  solar  system.  Both  these  things,  indeed,  may  come 
from  the  sun,  but  the  power  of  gravitation  is  one  thing,  the 
power  of  the  sun's  light  another.  And  so  in  the  system 
of  Redemption — the  atoning  sacrifice  of  Christ  is  one  thing, 
the  regenerating  influences  of  the  Spirit  are  another.  And 
as  in  the  solar  system,  it  may  be  said  that  the  power  of 
gravitation  is  what  holds  the  earth  in  its  orbit,  so  that  the 
sun's  light  may  clothe  it  in  beauty,  so,  in  the  system  of 
Redemption,  the  sacrifice  of  Christ  is  what  holds  man  in 
his  orbit,  in  such  a  way  that  the  light  of  the  cross  and  the 
influences  of  the  Spirit  may  clothe  the  soul  in  the  beauty 


THE    CHRISTIAN    PHILOSOPHER.  241 

and  life  of  righteousness.  For,  without  the  shedding  of 
blood,  there  is  no  remission ;  and  it  is  a  dying  Christ  that 
must  render  possible  with  God  the  \vorld's  reconciliation, 
before  a  living  Christ  can  be  the  world's  regeneration.  It 
is  a  dying  Christ  that  must  hold  the  world  in  its  orbit  of 
probation  and  pardon,  that  it  may  not  sweep  madly  into 
the  gulf  of  retribution,  before  a  living  Christ  can  be  formed 
in  the  soul  the  hope  of  glory.  Wherefore,  the  names  writ- 
ten in  the  book  of  life  from  the  foundation  of  the  world,  are 
written  in  it  as  the  book  of  the  slain  Lamb.  It  is  the  blood 
of  Jesus  Christ  that  cleanseth  us  from  all  sin ;  and  to  lose 
sight  of  this  fact,  or  to  say  that  in  reference  to  God  and  the 
divine  attributes,  we  know  little  or  nothing  about  it,  is  to 
lose  sight  of  the  great  grandeur  of  the  atonement ;  of  the  cross 
as  the  central  point  of  glory  in  the  universe  ;  of  its  omnipo- 
tence as  a  disciplinary  system,  taking  the  place  of  law  ;  of 
its  power  in  magnifying  the  law,  and  confirming  and  sus- 
taining its  sanctions  ;  of  its  wisdom  and  efficacy  in  reveal- 
ing the  enormity  of  sin  ;  of  the  energy  with  which  it  speaks 
to  the  conscience,  convincing  of  guilt  in  the  very  work 
undertaken  for  guilt's  removal ;  of  its  definitcness,  and 
might,  and  concentrating  glory  in  its  display  of  the  divine 
attributes ;  and,  in  fine,  of  its  whole  ulterior  influences  on 
the  universe,  and  in  the  government  of  God. 

Even  in  regard  to  ourselves  subjectively,  the  atonement 
can  be  perfectly  understood  in  its  influence  upon  us,  only 
when  we  take  into  view  its  display  of  the  divine  character, 
and  the  manner  in  which  the  light  of  the  divine  attributes 
comes  through  its  instrumentality  into  the  soul.  Our  need 
of  Christ  is  not  the  whole  even  of  the  subjective  aspect, 
inasmuch  as  the  sight  of  ourselves  in  the  light  of  Christ's 
passion,  constitutes  a  great  part  of  it,  revealing  the  divine 
holiness  and  our  guilt.  In  fine,  Mr.  Coleridge's  view  of  the 
atonement  excludes  all  notice  of  some  of  the  grandest, 
clearest,  brightest,  far-reaching  passages  in  the  Holy  Scrip- 
tures; the  passages  in  the  3d  of  Romans  and  1st  Colos- 

11 


242  CHARACTERISTICS    OF 

sians  included,  in  which,  if  language  means  anything,  it 
means  that  it  is  not  the  redemption  in  trs  through  which 
we  are  justified,  but  the  gi-ace  of  God  through  the  Redemp- 
tion that  is  in  Christ  Jesus :  a  redemption  also,  which  we 
have  in  him  through  his  blood ;  the  forgiveness  of  sins,  on 
the  ground  of  that  declaration  or  manifestation  of  the  divine 
righteousness,  which  has  made  the  justification  of  the  be- 
liever possible.  ''  Whom  God  hath  set  forth,  a  propitiation 
through  faith  in  his  blood,  to  declare  his  righteousness  for 
the  remission  of  sins,  through  the  forbearance  of  God,  that 
he  might  be  just  and  the  justifier  of  him  which  believeth 
in  Jesus." 

There  seems  to  be  in  the  human  mind  as  real  a  demand 
objectively  for  such  an  atonement,  in  regard  to  the  display 
and  justification  of  God^s  attributes,  as  there  is  subjectively 
for  a  personal  Christ  as  the  life  of  God  in  the  soul  of  man. 
It  might  have  been  wished  that  Dr.  Marsh,  along  with  his 
rich,  valuable,  masterly  treatise  on  man's  need  of  a  Saviour, 
an  essay  as  precious  in  its  spiritual  influence  as  it  is  philo- 
sophically profound  in  its  view  of  our  fallen  nature,  had 
combined,  as  its  counterpart,  a  treatise  on  the  necessity 
for  the  same  Saviour  on  the  part  of  the  divine  attributes. 
No  higher  service  could  have  been  rendered  to  the  church 
than  such  a  treatise  by  such  a  mind  would  have  consti- 
tuted. Perhaps,  had  he  lived  a  little  longer,  this  would 
have  been  one  labor,  to  which  his  great  and  noble  powers, 
his  impartial  judgment,  and  his  sincere,  prayerful,  and 
earnest  spirit  of  inquiry  would  have  been  dedicated. 

There  is  an  inner  circle  of  qualities  and  attainments  in 
Dr.  Marsh's  character  and  habitudes,  as  a  Christian  and  a 
scholar,  which  I  have  not  noted,  and  upon  which  it  would 
not  be  possible,  within  this  brief  space,  to  dwell.  Some 
little  idea  of  his  acquisitions  may  be  gathered  from  the 
perusal  of  the  admirably  edited  volume  of  his  Remains; 
and  in  that  volume,  those  who  did  not  know  him  before, 
will  feel  that  they  know  him  now ;  and  that  our  country, 


THE    CHRISTIAN    PHILOSOPHER.  243 

as  well  as  this  University,  has  sustained  a  loss  in  his  de- 
parture, not  easily,  nor  in  a  moment,  made  up.  We  in- 
dulge the  hope,  that  under  his  own  tuition  there  may  have 
been  scholars  now  in  training,  whose  well-developed  minds 
and  hearts  will  ere  long  do  something  to  supply  his  influ- 
ence, and  fill  his  place  ;  living  stones,  chosen  by  the  Great 
Head  of  the  Church,  and  now  in  the  process  of  cutting  and 
polishing,  that  they  also  may  shine  gloriously  in  his  Living 
Temple. 

The  volume  of  Dr.  Marsh's  remains  will  be  found  to 
contain  the  elements  of  a  philosophy,  which  even  those  who 
are  not  prepared  to  receive  it  in  its  details  in  regard  to  the 
Will,  or  the  distinction  between  the  Reason  and  the  Under- 
standing, must  rejoice  to  behold  among  us  in  a  native 
original  form,  that  it  may  become  the  subject  of  study, 
investigation  and  proof  ;  for  it  introduces  the  mind  to  so 
much  wider  a  sphere  of  discipline  and  knowledge  than  that 
w^hich  has  been  customary,  it  defines  so  clearly  the  objects 
and  the  sphere  of  science,  and  demands  so  absolutely  the 
union  of  the  natural  sciences  with  the  science  of  our  own 
being,  adopting  the  dynamic  theory,  defining  the  spheres  of 
physiology  and  psychology,  and  in  such  wise  linking  the 
philosophy  of  nature  with  that  which  is  above  nature,  and 
that  which  is  above  nature  directly  with  God,  that  if  it  once 
become  the  habit  of  our  students,  our  students  themselves 
will  be  different  beings  ;  with  a  nobleness  of  mind,  a  range 
and  depth  of  knowledge,  and  a  comprehensiveness,  clear- 
ness, and  accuracy  of  view,  such  as  has  been  by  no  means 
common.  Indeed,  we  are  persuaded  that  this  philosophy 
will  be  as  a  new  and  better  invigorating  atmosphere  for  the 
mind  and  heart,  so  that  the  intellectual  growth  which  rises 
in  it  will  be  nobler,  more  original,  more  worthy  of  the  ali- 
ment, both  of  natural  and  supernatural  truth,  than  any 
that  in  our  country  has  yet  come  into  being. 

This  we  say  with  the  more  confidence,  because  Dr. 
Marsh's  opinions  were  neither  hastily  adopted,  nor  hastily 


244 


CHARACTERISTICS    OF 


expressed.  They  were  neither  indefinite  nor  mystical  in 
his  own  mind,  and  such  was  the  law  of  his  own  mental 
constitution,  that  he  could  not  e?  press  them  indefinitely  to 
others.  I  know  not  where  in  our  literature  you  can  find 
more  clearness,  simplicity  and  accuracy  in  the  conveyance 
of  philosophical  thoughts.  He  did  not  merely  theorize,  but 
sought  to  express  realities.  His  views  of  man's  nature  as 
a  spiritual  being,  of  his  destiny,  and  of  the  education  ap- 
propriate and  necessary  to  the  development  of  that  being, 
were  not  matters  of  mere  speculation.  They  made  in  him 
a  fountain  of  important,  solemn,  elewated,  practicalthought. 
The  correlative  adaptations  of  the  soul  to  truth,  and  of 
divine  truth  to  the  soul,  were  never  more  affectingly  dis- 
played. His  views  were  deeply  interesting  of  the  adapta- 
tion of  man's  outward  temple  and  circumstances  to  the 
development  of  his  inward  being  ;  and  of  the  manner  in 
which  God  educates  our  affections,  that  they  may  be  the 
medium  of  intercourse  with  him  ;  giving  us  correlative  ob- 
jects for  the  affections  of  our  temporal  being,  and  as  full  a 
supply  in  Christ  for  our  spiritual  and  eternal  being.  He 
has  spoken  nobly  of  the  eternal  distinction  between  self- 
interest  and  duty,  as  the  ground  of  action.  On  the  subject 
of  original  sin,  he  has  presented  a  most  powerful  and  simple 
view  of  our  alienation  from  God,  and  of  the  nature  of  sin 
in  our  being.  He  has  laid  down  a  principle  of  the  utmost 
importance  in  all  philosophical  discussions,  that  "  no  merely 
speculative  conclusions  can  supersede  the  immediate  con- 
victions of  practical  truth  in  our  moral  being." 

He  had  large  and  comprehensive  views  of  the  system  of 
nature,  of  organic  life,  of  the  connection  between  different 
created  natures,  of  the  laws  of  organization  and  develop- 
ment ;  and  had  reflected  profoundly  on  the  principle  or  idea 
that  must  govern  the  form.  But  all  these  investigations 
he  pursued  in  a  higher  light  than  any  philosopher  ever  did 
or  could,  without  standing  in  the  sun,  as  his  soul  did,  in 
the  centre  of  the  system  of  Christianity.     ''  See  how  near," 


THE    CHRISTIAN    PHILOSOPHER.  245 

says  he,  '^  according  to  the  above  way  of  looking  at  the  ob- 
jects of  knowledge,  everything  in  nature  is  placed  to  its 
spiritual  ground,  and  how  the  higher  spiritual  consciousness 
in  man  finds  itself  in  immediate  intercourse  with  the  spir- 
itual world  ;  rather  in  the  immediate  presence  of  God." 
His  philosophy  was  imbued  with  his  Christianity,  and  he 
delighted  to  prosecute  its  study  under  the  full  influence  of 
Christian  light  and  feeling,  tracing  every  good  thing  to 
God. 

In  his  philosophical  studies  he  was  a  great  lover  of  Mr. 
^oleridge's  profound,  beautiful,  and  suggestive  trains  of 
thought  and  illustration.  With  the  best  of  the  German 
philosophers  he  was  also  intimate  ;  but  whatsoever  he  re- 
ceived from  any  foreign  source  became  his  own,  became  in 
himself  original,  being  the  nourishment  of  a  mind  that  must 
produce  fruit  from  its  own  profoundness,  and  richness  of 
life  and  activity.  If  Mr.  Coleridge  had  possessed  Dr. 
Marsh's  practical,  industrious,  methodical  habits,  or  if  Dr. 
Marsh  had  been  permitted  to  enjoy  life,  as  a  working  period, 
to  the  more  advanced  age  at  which  Mr.  Coleridge  was 
called  away ;  in  either  case,  the  world  would  no  longer 
have  had  to  lament  the  want  of  a  grand  and  noble  scheme 
of  Christian  Philosophy  consummated.  And  if  now  I  were 
to  undertake  to  point  out  the  line  of  Dr.  Marsh's  investiga- 
tions more  definitely,  I  should  commence  with  the  following 
very  graiid  passage  from  one  of  Mr.  Coleridge's  somewhat 
desultory,  but  always  profound  and  interesting  chapters ; 
and  with  this  quotation  I  shall  leave  the  subject  of  Dr. 
Marsh's  philosophy. 

"  The  necessary  tendency  of  all  natural  philosophy  is 
from  nature  to  intelligence  ;  and  this,  and  no  other,  is  the 
true  ground  and  occasion  of  the  instinctive  striving  to  in- 
troduce theory  into  our  views  of  natural  phenomena.  The 
highest  perfection  of  natural  philosophy  would  consist  in 
the  perfect  spiritualization  of  all  the  laws  of  nature,  into 
laws  of  intuition  and  intellect.     The  phenomena,  (the  ma- 


246  CHARACTERISTICS    OF 

terial,)  must  wholly  disappear,  and  the  laws  alone  (the  for- 
mal,) must  remain.  Thence  it  comes  that  in  nature  itself, 
the  more  the  principle  of  law  breaks  forth,  the  more  does 
the  husk  drop  off,  the  phenomena  themselves  become  more 
spiritual,  and  at  length  cease  altogether  in  our  conscious- 
ness. The  optical  phenomena  are  but  a  geometry,  the  lines 
of  which  are  drawn  by  light,  and  the  materiality  of  this 
light  itself  has  already  become  matter  of  doubt.  In  the 
appearances  of  magnetism  all  trace  of  matter  is  lost,  and 
of  the  phenomena  of  gravitation,  which  not  a  few  among 
the  most  illustrious  Newtonians  have  declared  no  otherwise 
comprehensible,  than  as  an  immediate  spiritual  influence, 
there  remains  nothing  but  its  law,  the  execution  of  which 
on  a  vast  scale  is  the  mechanism  of  the  heavenly  motions. 
The  theory  of  natural  philosophy  would  then  be  completed  ; 
when  all  nature  was  demonstrated  to  be  identical  in  essence 
with  that  which,  in  its  highest  known  power,  exists  in  man 
as  an  intelligence,  and  self-consciousness  ;  when  the  heav- 
ens and  the  earth  shall  declare  not  only  the  power  of  their 
Maker,  but  the  glory  and  the  presence  of  their  God,  even 
as  he  appeared  to  the  great  prophet,  during  the  vision  of 
the  mount  in  the  skirts  of  his  Divinity."* 

I  have  but  one  word  to  add  in  reference  to  those  in  our 
country,  who  are  habitually  prejudiced,  and  not  unfre- 
quently  on  principle,  against  all  metaphysical  specula- 
tions ;  and  I  shall  do  it  in  the  language  of  that  great  writer 
who  has  been  noticed  as  Dr.  Marsh's  favorite  author ;  pre- 
mising that  the  perusal  of  the  volume  of  Dr.  Marsh's  Re- 
mains will  go  far  to  the  removal  of  such  prejudices  from 
every  religious  mind.  The  first  remark  which  Mr.  Cole- 
ridge makes  in  reference  to  such  a  prejudice,  is  this :  that 
true  metaphysics  are  nothing  else  but  true  divinity ;  and 
the  second  is  this,  that  "  as  long  as  there  are  men  in  the 
world,  to  whom  the  rvibdi  oeaviov  is  an  instinct  and  a  com- 
mand from  their  own  nature,  so  long  will  there  be  meta- 
*  Biocf.  Lit.  ch.  13. 


THE    CHRISTIAN    PHILOSOPHER.  247 

physicians,  and  metaphysical  speculations ;  that  false  met- 
aphysics can  be  effectually  counteracted  by  true  metaphy- 
sics alone ;  and  that  if  the  reasoning  be  clear,  solid  and 
pertinent,  the  truth  deduced  can  never  be  the  less  valua- 
ble on  account  of  the  depth  from  which  it  may  have  been 
drawn." 

In  recounting  the  many  and  great  excellencies  of  Br. 
Marsh's  character,  I  am  reminded  of  a  beautiful  passage 
in  Wordsworth's  Essay  on  Epitaphs.  *^  What  purity  and 
brightness  is  that  virtue  clothed  in,  the  image  of  which 
must  no  longer  bless  our  living  eyes  !  Tlie  character  of  a 
deceased  friend  or  beloved  kinsman  is  not  seen,  no,  nor 
ought  to  be  seen,  otherwise  than  as  a  tree  through  a  tender 
haze,  or  a  luminous  mist,  that  spiritualizes  and  beautifies 
it,  that  takes  av^^ay  indeed,  but  only  to  the  end  that  the 
parts  which  are  not  abstracted,  may  appear  more  dignified 
and  lovely,  may  impress  and  affect  the  more."  In  the 
present  case  there  is  no  such  tender  haze  needed,  though 
the  sympathy  of  the  mind  would  inevitably  produce  it,  if 
even  an  angel  had  departed ;  nor,  indeed,  is  anything 
needed,  but  the  most  distinct  delineation  of  the  worth  of 
the  dead,  without  borrowing  any  luminous  veil  from  the 
affections  of  the  living.  Dr.  Marsh  was  a  profound,  medi- 
tative, experimental  Christian.  We  have  placed  this  at 
the  head  of  all  his  qualities,  though  this  part  of  his  charac- 
ter was  not,  indeed,  so  much  a  separate  thing,  as  it  was 
the  life  of  all  his  other  excellencies,  the  atmosphere  in 
which  all  his  other  qualities  grew.  The  poet  Wither  beau- 
tifully says  of  "  his  remembrance  which  may  live  after  him, 

If,  therefore,  of  my  labors,  or  of  me, 
Aught  shall  remain,  when  I  removed  shall  be, 
Let  it  be  that  wherein  it  may  be  viewed. 
My  Maker's  image  was  in  me  renewed." 

I  am  sure  such  would  have  been  Dr.  Marsh's  desire  ;  and 
accordingly  no  one  can  peruse  the  volume  of  \m  Remains, 


248  CHARACTERISTICS    OF 

a  volume  destined  to  live  after  him,  and  the  simple  and 
beautiful  sketch  of  his  life  prefixed  to  it,  without  great  de- 
light to  find  a  spirit  of  such  deep,  unaffected,  unalloyed 
piety  breathing  through  it.  The  wish  of  the  Christian  Poet 
is  accomplished  in  this  volume,  which  contains  in  its  por- 
trait of  the  author  the  deep,  clear  lines  of  the  image  of 
God  renewed,  and  a  body  of  thought  that  could  only  have 
sprung  from  deep  Christian  experience. 

There  were  delightful  qualities  in  Dr.  Marsh's  character, 
of  which  I  have  not  spoken,  but  which  all  who  knew  him 
could  appreciate  even  better  than  they  could  understand 
his  profound  scholarship,  or  his  true  philosophical  worth. 
He  had  the  finest  feelings,  and  an  unselfish,  unworldly  heart ; 
a  very  rare  undeviating  singleness  of  purpose,  a  simplicity 
of  character  like  a  child's,  a  genuine  humility  of  mind,  and 
a  delightful  freedom  from  all  ostentation,  all  pride,  either 
of  talent  or  acquirement.  Indeed  this  latter  trait  in  him 
was  very  remarkable.  It  was,  in  part,  the  cause  of  that 
retired  calmness,  with  which,  unsolicitous  to  gain  a  name, 
and  careless  what  men  might  say  of  him,  he  proceeded  as 
on  the  path  of  duty,  in  his  philosophical  investigations. 
He  had  much  poetical  sensibility,  and  the  most  affection- 
ate social  feelings.  He  possessed  the  spirit  of  true  patriot- 
ism, and  would  to  God  that  such  exhibitions  among  us  of 
love  to  our  country,  as  may  be  found  in  his  Inaugural  Ad- 
dress, were  more  common  among  our  public  and  literary 
men.  We  want  men  of  principle,  men  of  patriotism, 
thinking  men,  and  praying  men. 

I  congratulate  this  Institution  that  it  has  possessed  so 
noble  a  Christian  Philosopher  and  scholar,  as  one  of  its 
]7residing  spirits ;  that  so  noble  a  contribution  has  been 
made  to  our  native,  original  philosophy  and  literature  in 
the  volume  of  his  Remains ;  that  a  personal  exemplar  of 
such  disinterested  views  and  holy  principles  has  been  before 
the  students ;  that  in  this  volume  they  have  the  stamp 
of  the  character  of  so  pure  and  simple-hearted,  yet  pro- 


THE    CHRISTIAN    PHILOSOPHER.  ^^ 

found  and  vigorous-minded  a  seeker  after  truth.  I  rejoice 
in  behalf  of  all  our  institutions,  that  there  has  been  such  a 
defender  of  the  necessary  agency  of  religious  truth  in  the 
cultivation  of  the  mind  ;  such  an  asserter  of  the  only  foun- 
dation of  permanence  and  sted fastness,  in  the  Divine  Word, 
and  the  religious  principle.  Our  republic  is  safe,  if  every- 
where the  guardians  of  our  youth,  the  teachers  of  the  minds 
and  hearts  of  our  children,  may  but  be  imbued  with  such 
views  of  truth  and  duty.  The  Spirit  of  God  attends  such 
views,  so  inculcated,  and  we  believe  ever  will ;  nor  has  the 
importance  of  such  teachings,  in  every  direction,  as  the 
Spirit  of  God  can  consistently  accompany,  such  as  will  co- 
operate and  not  conflict  with  his  divine  influences,  ever 
been  sufficiently  considered. 

The  memory  of  Dr.  Marsh's  great  and  profound  attain- 
ments, his  deep  piety  and  learning,  his  delightful  simplicity 
and  purity  of  soul,  would  have  long  remained  fresh  with 
those  who  knew  him,  even  if  no  fruits  of  his  genius  had 
been  left  after  him.  To  many  who  loved  him,  or  who 
sought  his  kindness  and  his  guidance,  he  was  so  familiar 
and  affectionate  a  friend,  that  he  left  them  almost  unaware 
that  he  was  a  great  man  ;  so  little  is  genuine  simplicity  of 
character  understood  or  valued  as  an  attribute  of  greatness. 
Indeed,  it  is  one  of  those  qualities  which  the  great  world  do 
not  understand  at  all,  and  which,  I  had  almost  said,  men 
can  see  only  by  not  looking  at  it,  but  by  being  made  par- 
takers of  it ;  it  being  indefinable,  omnipresent  as  an  atmos- 
phere, and  making  its  impression  unconsciously  upon  the 
soul.  Dr.  Marsh's  friends  kneiv  him  as  the  g-ood  man,  and 
the  sense  of  his  goodness  became  one  with,  and  familiarized 
the  impression  of  his  greatness.  They  loved  him  as  the 
good  man,  and  he  was,  indeed,  a  rare  and  precious  example 
of  the  union  of  the  child-like  Christian  with  the  profound 
Philosopher. 

His  reputation  abroad  is  established  by  fruits  of  his 
labors,  that   cannot  die  ;    but   far  better  is  the  fragrant 

11^ 


250  THE    CHRISTIAN    PHILOSOPHER. 

memory  of  his  goodness  at  home  ;  far  better  the  assurance 
that  there  where  he  was  best  known,  he  was  most  appre- 
ciated, revered,  beloved,  lamented.  While  we  remember 
his  wisdom,  and  dwell  upon  his  lovely  and  attractive  qual- 
ities this  day,  let  us  beware  lest  our  regret  that  God  has 
taken  him  away  so  early,  prevent  or  diminish  our  gratitude, 
that  we  have  been  permitted  to  enjoy  his  presence,  his  ex- 
ample, his  instructions,  so  long.  And  let  us  remember, 
that  though  God  may  not  have  moulded  us  in  so  peculiar 
a  constitution,  of  so  fine  and  exquisite  materials,  as  that 
we  might  aspire  or  attain  to  Dr.  Marsh's  intellectual  great- 
ness, yet  by  divine  grace  it  is  both  our  privilege  and  duty 
to  be  all  possessors  of  his  goodness,  in  being  made  partakers 
of  the  holiness  of  God  in  Christ. 


LIFE  AND  WRITINGS  OF  JOHN  FOSTER* 


Geologists  tell  us,  somewhat  quaintly,  that  great  and 
inexhaustible  springs  are  found  in  connection  with  what 
they  call  faults,  that  is,  breaks  in  the  continuity  of  the 
rooks.  There  must  be  these  breaks  in  the  strata,  and  if  it 
were  not  for  this  benevolent  arrangement  of  Providence, 
there  had  been  neither  running  fountains  nor  rivers,  but 
sluggish  stagnant  pools.  A  powerful  spring  is  not  to  be 
found  but  in  connection  with  the  existence  of  a  great  fault. 
The  despotic  crust  of  the  earth  must  be  broken  up,  before 
its  living  fountains  of  waters  can  gush  in  freedom  to  the 
surface.     There  is  an  instructive  analogy  in  all  this. 

An  Ecclesiastical  Despotism  would  keep  the  intellectual 
and  moral  world  without  faults^  that  is,  without  freedom : 
it  would  circle  the  globe  with  the  dead,  hard,  rocky  crust 
and  tetter  of  an  enforced  religious  uniformity  ;  it  would 
have  no  spontaneous,  powerful  springs  breaking  out  and 
running  freely  to  the  ocean.  But  God's  benevolent  power 
interposes,  and  breaks  up  the  despotic  continuity,  and  gives 
us  springs.  The  strata  of  establishments  being  pierced  and 
rent,  there  are  no  longer  stagnant  pools,  but  deep,  living 
fountains. 

The  analogy  might  be  extended  into  something  like  an 
argument  for  the  necessity  and  usefulness  of  various  de- 

*  The  Life  and  Correspondence  of  John  Foster.  Edited  by  J.  E.  Ryleuid. 
With  notices  of  Mr.  Foster  as  a  Preacher  and  a  Companion,  by  John  Shep- 
PARD,  author  of  "Thoughts  on  Devotion,"  etc.,  etc.  In  two  volumes.  New 
York,  Wiley  &  Putnam,  161  Broadway,  \846.— Biblical  Repoftitory. 


252  LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

nominations  in  the  Church  of  Christ.  These  things  are 
not  necessarily  the  result  of  sectarianism,  but  of  freedom ; 
and  God  makes  use  of  these  faults,  even  if  we  admitted 
them  to  be,  not  merely  in  the  geological,  but  moral  sense 
of  the  term,  faults, — for  the  productioa  of  vastly  greater 
good  than  ever  there  could  have  been  without  them.  They 
are  not  faults,  but  blessings  ;  and  though  men  may  abuse 
them,  they  are  the  assurance  and  the  safeguard  of  spiritual 
freedom. 

Of  the  English  miads  that  have  departed  from  our  world 
within  a  few  years,  none  have  excited  a  deeper  interest,  or 
wielded  for  a  season  a  loftier  power,  than  John  Foster  and 
Robert  Hall.  They  were  both  triumphant  instances  of  the 
superiority  of  intellect,  and  the  homage  that  will  be  paid  to 
it,  over  all  circumstance  and  mere  external  distinction. 
One  of  the  most  obvious  reflections  that  rises  in  the  mind 
of  a  thoughtful  observer  of  the  greatness  and  power  of  such 
intellect,  after  the  first  analysis  and  admiration  of  its  ele- 
ments, may  be  that  it  was  a  possession  and  result  of  what 
is  called  the  voluntary  system.  These  men  were  two  of 
the  "  Intellectual  Incas"  of  their  race.  In  the  two  together, 
there  were  combined  nearly  all  the  grand  qualities  that 
ever  go  to  make  up  minds  of  the  highest  order ;  severity 
and  affluence,  keenness  and  magnificence,  simplicity  and 
sublimity  of  thought ;  ruggedness,  power,  and  elaborate 
beauty  and  exquisiteness  of  style  ;  precision  and  splendor 
of  language  ;  condensed  energy,  fire,  and  diffusive  richness 
of  imagination  ;  originality,  independence,  and  perfect 
classical  elegance ;  comprehensiveness  and  accuracy ;  no- 
bleness of  feeling,  intense  hatred  of  oppression.  Christian 
humility,  childlike  simplicity. 

And  yet  there  were  greater  differences  between  them 
than  there  were  similarities.  In  some  respects  their  minds 
were  of  quite  an  opposite  mould.  Hall's  mind  was  more 
mathematical  than  Foster's,  and  he  was  distinguished  for 
his  power  of  abstract  speculation,  and  his  love  and  habit  of 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  253 

reasoning.  The  tenor  of  Foster's  mind  was  less  argument- 
ative, but  more  absolute,  more  intuitive,  more  rapidly  and 
thoroughly  observant. 

The  impression  of  power  is  greater  from  the  mind  of 
Foster  than  of  Hall.  On  this  account,  and  for  its  emi- 
nently suggestive  properties,  Foster's  general  style,  both  of 
thinking  and  writing,  is  much  to  be  preferred  ;  though 
Hall's  has  the  most  sustained  and  elaborate  beauty.  Yet 
the  word  elaborate  is  not  strictly  applicable  to  Hall's  style, 
which  is  the  natural  action  of  his  mind,  the  movement,  not 
artificial,  nor  supported  by  effort,  in  which  his  thoughts 
arranged  themselves  with  the  precision  and  regularity  of  a 
Roman  cohort.  Hall's  was  a  careful  beauty  of  expression, 
his  carefulness  and  almost  fastidiousness  of  taste  being  a 
second  nature  to  him  ;  Foster's  was  a  careless  mixture  of 
ruggedness  and  beauty,  the  ruggedness  greatly  predomi- 
nating. Hall's  style  is  too  constantly,  too  uniformly  reg- 
ular ;  it  becomes  monotonous ;  it  is  like  riding  or  walking 
a  vast  distance  over  a  level  macadamized  road  ;  a  difficult 
mountain  would  be  an  interval  of  relief.  We  feel  the  need 
of  something  to  break  up  the  uniformity,  and  startle  the 
mind  and  we  would  like  here  and  there  to  pass  through  an 
untrodden  wilderness,  or  a  gloomy  forest,  or  to  have  some 
unexpected  solemn  apparition  rise  before  us.  There  is 
more  of  the  romantic  in  Fost(ir  than  in  Hall,  and  Foster's 
style  is  sometimes  thickset  with  expressions  that  sparkle 
with  the  electric  fire  of  imagination. 

Hall's  mind,  in  the  comparison  of  the  two,  is  more  like 
an  inland  lake,  in  which  you  can  see,  though  many  fathoms 
deep,  the  clear  white  sand,  and  the  smallest  pebbles  on  the 
bottom.  Foster's  is  rather  like  the  Black  Sea  in  commo- 
tion. Hall  gives  you  more  of  known  truth,  with  inimitable 
perspicuity  and  happiness  of  arrangement;  Foster  sets 
your  own  mind  in  pursuit  of  truth,  fills  you  with  longings 
after  the  unknown,  leads  you  to  the  brink  of  frightful 
precipices.     There  is  something  such  a  difi'erence  between 


254  LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

the  two,  as  between  Raphael  the  sociable  angel,  relating 
to  Adam  in  his  bower,  the  history  of  creation,  and  Michael, 
ascending  with  him  the  mountain,  to  tell  him  what  shall 
happen  from  his  fall. 

Hall's  mind  is  like  a  royal  garden,  with  rich  fruits,  and 
overhanging  trees  in  vistas;  Foster's  is  a  stern,  wild, 
mountainous  region,  likely  to  be  the  haunt  of  banditti. 
As  a  preacher.  Hall  must  have  been  altogether  superior  to 
Foster  in  the  use  and  application  of  ordinary  important 
evangelical  truth,  "for  reproof,  correction,  and  instruction 
in  righteousness."  But  Foster  probably  sometimes  reached 
a  grander  style,  and  threw  upon  his  audience  sublimer 
illustrations  and  masses  of  thought.  Foster  was  not  suc- 
cessful as  a  preacher  ;  his  training  and  natural  habits  were 
unfortunate  for  that ;  and  the  range  of  thought,  in  which 
his  mind  spontaneously  moved,  was  too  far  aloof  from 
men's  common  uses,  abilities  of  perception,  tastes  and  dis- 
position. But  Hall  was  doubtless  one  of  the  greatest 
preachers  that  ever  lived.  Yet  there  were  minds  that 
would  prefer  Foster,  and  times  at  which  all  the  peculiar 
qualities  of  his  genius  would  be  developed  in  a  grander 
combination  of  sublimity  and  power.  As  a  general  thing, 
Hall  must  have  been  more  like  Paul  preaching  at  Athens 
in  a  Roman  toga ;  Foster,  like  John  the  Baptist  in  the 
wilderness,  with  a  leathern  girdle  about  his  loins,  eating 
locusts  and  wild  honey.  He  speaks  of  one  of  his  own 
sermons,  which  a  man  would  give  much  to  have  heard ; 
we  can  imagine  some  of  its  characteristics.  It  was  on  the 
oath  of  the  angel,  with  one  foot  upon  the  sea,  and  another 
on  the  land,  swearing  that  Time  should  be  no  longer ;  and 
his  own  mind  was  in  a  luminous,  winged  state  of  freedom 
and  fire,  that  seemes  to  have  surprised  himself;  but  no 
record  of  the  sermon  is  preserved. 

The  vigor  and  uptwisting  convolutions  of  Foster's  style 
are  the  results  simply  of  the  strong  workings  of  the 
thought,    and    not    of  any  elaborate    artificial   formation. 


\ 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  251^ 

\ 

For  though  he  labored  upon  his  sentences,  with  unexam- 
pled interest  and  care,  after  his  thoughts  had  run  them  in 
their  own  original  mould,  they  were  always  the  creation 
of  the  thought,  and  not  a  mould  prepared  for  it.  The 
thought  had  always  the  living  law  of  its  external  form 
within  it.  We  know  of  scarce  another  example  in 
English  literature,  where  so  much  beauty,  precision,  and 
yet  genuine  and  inveterate  originality  are  combined.  It 
is  like  the  hulk  of  a  ship  made  out  of  the  smoothed  knees 
of  knotty  oak. 

There  is  a  glow  of  life  in  such  a  style,  and  not  merely 
quiet  beauty,  whether  elaborate  or  natural,  that  is  like  the 
glow  in  the  countenance  of  a  healthy  man,  after  a  rapid 
walk  in  a  clear  frosty  morning.  But  it  sometimes  reminds 
you  of  a  naked  athletic  wrestler,  struggling  to  throw  his 
adversary,  all  the  veins  and  muscles  starting  out  in  the 
effort.  Foster's  style  is  like  the  statue  of  Laocoon  writh- 
ing against  the  serpent:  Hall's  reminds  you  more  of  the 
Apollo  of  the  Vatican.  The  difference  was  the  result  of 
the  intense  effort  with  which  Foster's  mind  wrought  out 
and  condensed,  in  the  same  process,  its  active  meditations. 
Everywhere  it  gives  you  the  impression  of  power  at  work, 
and  his  illustrations  themselves  seem  to  be  hammered  on 
the  anvil.  It  gives  you  the  picture  he  has  drawn  of  him- 
self, or  his  biographer  for  him,  in  the  attitude  of  what  he 
called  pumping-.  At  Brearly  Hall  he  used  to  try  and  im- 
prove himself  in  composition,  by  "  taking  paragraphs  from 
different  writers  and  trying  to  remodel  them,  sentence  by 
sentence,  into  as  many  forms  of  expression  as  he  possibly 
could.  His  posture  on  these  occasions  was  to  sit  with  a 
hand  on  each  knee,  and  moving  his  body  to  and  fro,  he 
would  remain  silent  for  a  considerable  time,  till  his  inven- 
tion in  shaping  his  materials  had  exhausted  itself.  This 
process  he  used  to  call  pumping'.''^  Foster's  style  is  the 
very  image  of  a  mind  working  itself  to  and  fro,  with  in- 
ward intensity. 


256  LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

The  characteristics  of  power  and  rugged  thought  in 
Foster,  are  admirably  set  forth  in  some  of  his  own  images. 
Speaking  in  his  journal  of  a  certain  individual's  discourse, 
he  says,  "  he  has  a  clue  of  thread  of  gold  in  his  hand,  and 
he  unwinds  for  you  ell  after  ell ;  but  g-ive  me  the  man  ivho 
will  throw  the  clue  at  once^  and  let  me  unwind  it,  and 
then  show  in  his  hand  another  ready  to  follow ^ 

He  speaks  of  the  great  deficiency  of  what  may  be  called 
conclusive  writing  and  speaking.  "  How  seldom  we  feel 
at  the  end  of  the  paragraph  or  discourse,  that  some- 
thing is  settled  and  done.  It  lets  our  habit  of  thinking  and 
feeling  just  be  as  it  was.  It  rather  carries  on  a  parallel 
to  the  line  of  the  mind,  at  a  peaceful  distance,  than  fires 
down  a  tangent  to  smite  across  itP  Foster  always  smote 
across  the  mind. 

"  Many  things,"  says  he,  "  may  descend  from  the  sky 
of  truth,  without  deeply  striking  and  interesting  men ;  as 
from  the  cloudy  sky,  rain,  snow,  (fee,  may  descend  without 
exciting  ardent  attention  ;  it  must  be  large  hailstones,  the 
sound  of  thunder,  torrent  rain,  and  the  lightning's  flash  ; 
analogous  to  these  must  be  the  ideas  and  propositions, 
which  strike  men's  minds."  Foster's  own  writings  are 
eminently  thus  exciting.  And  it  may  be  said  of  him,  as 
he  remarked  of  Lord  Chatham,  speaking  of  the  absence  of 
argumentative  reasoning  in  his  speeches ;  "  he  struck,  as 
by  intuition,  directly  on  the  results  of  reasoning,  as  a 
common  shot  strikes  the  mark,  without  your  seeing  its 
course  through  the  air  as  it  moves  towards  its  object."  But 
Foster  thought,  and  reasoned  in  thinking,  most  intensely 
and  laboriously ;  it  was  not  mere  intuition  that  has  filled 
his  pages  with  such  condensed  results. 

Foster  and  Hall  were  both  men  of  great  independence 
of  mind  ;  but  Hall's  independence  was  not  combined  with 
so  great  a  degree  of  originality,  and  it  received  more  gently 
into  itself  in  acquiescence  the  habitudes  of  society,  and  the 
characteristics  of  other  minds.     Foster's  independence  was 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN     FOSTER.  257 

that  of  bare  truth ;  he  hated  the  frippery  of  circumstance, 
the  throwing  of  truth  upon  external  support.  He  would 
have  it  go  for  no  more  than  it  was  worth.  And  anything 
like  the  imposition  of  an  external  ceremonial,  he  could  not 
endure.  He  went  so  far  as  to  wish  that  everything  cere- 
monial and  sacerdotal  could  T^e  cleared  out  of  our  religious 
economy.  He  wanted  nothing  at  all  to  come  between  the 
soul  of  man  and  free  unmingled  truth.  The  hearty  con- 
viction of  truth,  and  the  pure  acting  from  it,  was  what  he 
required.  He  abhorred  all  manner  of  intolerance  with  such 
vehemence  and  intensity  of  hatred,  that  if  he  could  have 
had  a  living  Nemesis  for  the  retribution  of  crimes  not  pun- 
ished by  human  law,  it  would  have  been  for  that.  He 
hated  everything  that  tempted  man  to  dissemble,  to  seem 
or  assume  what  he  was  not.  He  hated  oppression  in  every 
form.  He  hated  a  state-established  hierarchy,  as  "  infinitely 
pernicious  to  Christianity." 

We  have  in  these  volumes  a  record  of  the  life  and  cor- 
respondence of  this  most  original  and  powerful  mind  ;  yet 
it  was  a  mind  in  some  respects  strangly  constructed,  or 
rather,  we  should  say,  strangely  self-disciplined,  and  in 
some  respects  out  of  order  for  ivant  of  self-discipline.  Look- 
ing through  the  whole  seventy  years  and  more  of  Foster's 
life,  and  remembering  the  magnificent  intellectual  endow- 
ments with  which  it  pleased  God  to  create  him,  and  the 
almost  uninterrupted  health  and  comparative  leisure  en- 
joyed for  nearly  fifty  years,  there  will  seem  to  have  been  by 
him  but  little  accomplished,  there  will  seem  to  have  been 
almost  a  waste  of  power.  We  might,  in  some  respects, 
compare  Foster  with  Coleridge ;  in  respect  of  originality 
and  power  of  intellect,  they  were  very  much  alike  ;  not 
so  in  variety,  comprehensiveness,  and  profoundness  of  eru- 
dition ;  for  while  Coleridge's  acquisitions  were  vast  and  va- 
ried, Foster's  were  much  rather  limited.  But  both  were 
blest  with  transcendent  powers  of  mind  and  grand  oppor- 
tunities, and  yet  accomplished  comparatively  little ;  and  a 


258  LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

severe  censor  might  say,  are  instances  of  a  lamentable  dis- 
use of  intellect.  Taking  Coleridge's  miserable  health  into 
view,  and  the  fact  that  he  was  not,  like  Foster,  at  an  early- 
period  brought  under  the  impulse  of  true  religion,  we  ought 
perhaps  to  say,  that  of  the  two,  Coleridge  accomplished  the 
most.  But  taking  the  character  of  Foster's  efforts  into 
consideration,  their  more  immediate  bearing  on  men's  high- 
est interests  must  incline  us  to  put  the  adjudged  superiority 
of  amount  to  his  score. 

The  development  of  character  and  opinion  in  these  vol- 
umes is  intensely  interesting  and  instructive  ;  so  is  the  dis- 
play and  observance  of  influences  and  causes  forming  and 
directing  opinion  ;  so,  likewise  is  the  struggle  between  con- 
science and  habit,  between  grandeur  of  impulse  and  judg- 
ment, conflicting  with  native  and  habitual  indolence  and 
procrastination.  There  was,  in  the  first  place,  a  strong, 
peculiar,  obstinate,  iron  mould,  which  might  have  made 
the  man,  under  certain  circumstances,  as  hinted  in  one  of 
Foster's  own  Essays,  a  Minos  or  a  Draco  ;  but  which,  had 
it  been  filled  with  apostolic  zeal  in  the  love  of  Christ  and 
of  souls,  would  have  made  almost  another  apostle.  There 
were  tendencies  to  deep  and  solemn  thought,  and  to  great 
wrestlings  of  the  intellect  and  spirit,  which,  brought  under 
the  full  influence  of  the  "  powers  of  the  world  to  come," 
and  developed  in  the  intense  benevolence  of  a  soul  by  faith 
freed  from  condemnation,  and  habitually  communing  with 
God  in  Christ,  w^ould  have  given  as  great  a  spiritual  mas- 
tery over  this  world  as  any  human  being  could  well  be 
conceived  to  exercise.  But  for  this  purpose  there  must 
have  been  a  holy  and  deep  baptism  in  the  Word  of  God, 
an  unassailable  faith  in,  and  most  humble  acquiescence 
with,  and  submission  to,  its  dictates  ;  a  familiarity  with  it 
as  the  daily  food  of  the  soul,  and  experience  of  it,  as  of  a 
fire  in  one's  bones,  admitting  no  human  speculation  to  put  it 
out ;  no  theory  of  mere  human  opinion,  or  feelings,  or  imagi- 
nation, to  veil,  or  darken  or  make  doubtful  its  realities. 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  259 

Now  the  want  of  this  kind  of  familiarity  with  the  Scrip- 
tures, this  profound  study  and  experience  of  them ;  this 
unhesitating  reception  of  them  as  the  infallible  Word  of 
God ;  may  have  been  the  secret  of  some  of  Foster's  great- 
est difficulties.  There  was  nothing  but  this  fixedness  in 
God's  Word,  that  could  be  the  helm  of  a  mind  of  such  un- 
usual power  and  original  tendencies.  Foster  wanted  an 
all-controlling  faith  ;  he  wanted  submission  to  the  Word 
of  God  as  the  decisive,  supreme,  last  appeal.  Foster's 
character  was  somewhat  like  that  of  Thomas  among  the 
Apostles ;  gloomy  tendencies  in  it,  inveterate  convolutions 
of  opinion,  seclusion  in  its  own  depths,  and  sometimes  only 
faith  enough  just  to  save  him  from  despair. 

He  had  a  strong  self-condemning  conscience,  a  clear, 
massive  view  and  powerful  conception  of  human  depravity, 
but  not  an  early  and  accurate  view,  or  powerful  sense,  of 
the  infinite  odiousness  of  sin,  as  manifested  by  the  divine 
law,  the  divine  holiness,  and  the  divine  atonement.  He 
had  an  instinctive,  vigorous  appreciation  of  the  ignorance, 
crime,  and  evil  in  human  society,  a  sense  of  its  misery,  and 
a  disposition  to  dwell  upon  its  gloomy  shades,  which  made 
him,  as  an  observer,  what  Caravaggio  or  Espagnoletto  were 
as  painters ;  tremendously  dark  and  impressive  in  his  de- 
lineations. But  it  was  quite  as  much  the  instinct  and 
taste  of  the  painter,  as  it  was  the  light  of  the  Word  of  God, 
revealing  the  depths  of  Satan.  It  was  the  native  intensity 
of  observation,  combined  with  a  saturnine  turn  of  mind, 
and  intermingled  with  revelations  of  things  as  they  are, 
beneath  the  light  of  the  Divine  Attributes. 

Mr.  Foster  came  early  under  the  power  of  religious  con- 
viction, but  evidently  not  in  the  happiest  manner,  and  not 
so  as  to  bring  him  at  once  thoroughly,  heartily,  confidingly, 
to  Christ.  Perhaps  there  may  be  traced  much  of  what  is 
called  legal  (at  least  for  a  long  time),  mingled  with  his 
acceptance  of  Christ  as  the  only  refuge  of  his  soul,  or  as  he 
would  sometimes  have  denominated  it,  with  his  views  of 


260 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 


the  economy  of  human  redemption.  There  was  more  of 
the  general  reliance  of  the  mind  upon  that  as  an  economy, 
than  of  the  personal  reliance  of  the  soul  upon  Christ  as  a 
Saviour.  One  cannot  but  be  impressed  with  the  fact  of 
the  great  absence,  throughout  the  whole  tenor  of  his  letters, 
his  conversations,  and  the  mould  of  his  \ik  and  character 
till  a  late  period, — the  great  absence  and  want  of  habitual, 
and  even  occasional  reference  to  the  love  of  Christ,  the  claims 
of  the  cross,  the  authority  of  the  Word  of  God,  and  all  that 
is  peculiar  to  the  gospel.  Perhaps  there  may  have  been  an 
intentional  exclusion  of  these  topics,  as  trite  and  technical, 
induced  by  an  extseme  of  the  same  feelings  with  which  he 
wrote  so  severely  concerning  the  customary  diction  of  evan- 
gelical piety,  and  which  passed  unawares  into  a  fastidious- 
ness, and  almost  aversion  in  his  own  mind,  which  became 
habitual.  His  letters  to  Miss  Saunders  at  the  close  of  these 
volumes,  show  how  entirely  he  threw  oft'  any  such  embar- 
rassment, when  roused  to  the  work  of  presenting  eternal 
realities  to  an  immortal  spirit  on  the  threshold  of  eternity. 
But  from  an  early  period,  his  disgust  at  the  peculiar  diction 
of  the  gospel,  as  used  by  men  who  seemed  to  have  lost  all 
perception  of  the  sublime  ideas  intended  to  be  conveyed  by 
it,  may  have  operated  insensibly  in  the  way  of  a  prejudice 
against  some  of  those  ideas  themselves. 

He  had  indeed  a  sense  of  guilt,  which  became,  at  a  later 
period,  absorbing  and  powerful ;  and  a  sense  of  the  atone- 
ment, which  grew  deeper  and  deeper  to  the  last,  with  a 
most  entire  reliance  upon  it ;  but  mingled  with  this,  and 
influencing  his  whole  habit  of  thought  and  feeling,  and  even 
of  belief,  far  more  than  he  would  himself  have  been  willing 
to  acknowledge,  there  seems  at  one  time  to  have  been  a 
secret  unconscious  reliance  on  the  hope  that  the  Supreme 
Judge  would  not  be  so  rigidly  severe  in  the  scrutiny  of 
mortals,  as  the  terms  of  the  Gospel  and  the  Law  imply ; 
so  that,  instead  of  relying  solely  on  the  merits  of  Christ,  as 
a  sinner  utterly  and  forever  lost  without  him,  he  appeared 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  261 

to  rely  on  the  mercy  of  God  as  a  lenient,  compassionate 
Judge,  in  whose  sight  an  amiable  and  good  life  might  also 
come  between  the  sinner  and  the  fear  of  an  inexorable  judg- 
ment. We  think  this  feeling  is  plainly  to  be  detected  in 
what  Foster  says  of  the  gromids  of  his  hope  in  the  case  of 
his  own  son.  And  though  in  his  own  case  he  was  always 
gloomily  and  severely  self-accusing,  yet  it  seemed  much  like 
the  same  experience  in  the  case  of  Dr.  Johnson,  whom  Fos- 
ter not  a  little  resembled  in  some  characteristics  ;  and,  as  in 
the  case  of  Dr.  Johnson,  Foster's  own  personal  view  of 
Christ,  and  reliance  upon  him,  and  sense  of  deliverance 
from  condemnation,  were  always  greatly  dimmed  and  di- 
minished by  the  ever-recurring  habit  of  looking  for  some- 
thing in  himself,  and  in  his  preparation  to  meet  God,  as  a 
ground  of  confidence.  A  more  defective  religious  experi- 
ence, for  a  season,  in  so  eminent  a  Christian  Minister,  we 
think  is  rarely  to  be  found  on  record.  Indeed,  compared 
with  men  like  Newton,  Scott,  Ryland,  Hill,  with  Mr.  Hall, 
and  some  others,  either  but  little  preceding  or  quite  con- 
temporary with  Foster,  he  appears  sometimes  almost  like 
a  strong-minded,  intellectual  but  half-enlightened  Pagan,  in 
the  comparison. 

This  defective  early  experience,  and  Foster's  strong  an- 
tipathy to  the  technicals  of  evangelical  piety,  especially  if 
approximating  in  his  view  in  any  manner  to  cant,  together 
with  his  want  of  continued,  thorough,  systematic  or  scrip- 
tural study  of  theology,  acted  and  reacted  on  each  other. 
And  at  one  time  he  was  so  disastrously  under  the  power  of 
a  tendency  to  rationalism,  and  to  a  choice  of  what  to  be- 
lieve irrespective  of  the  Scriptures,  that  he  seems  to  have 
come  very  near  to  the  slough  of  the  Socinian  system.  He 
had  a  strong  corrective  in  the  piety  and  influence  of  his 
friend,  the  Rev.  Mr.  Hughes,  to  whose  correspondence  and 
conversation  he  evidently  owed  much.  But  he  had  great 
repugnance  to  anything  like  a  "  party  of  systematics,"  and 
he  carried  his  natural  independence  and  hatred  of  restraint 


262 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 


to  such  a  degree,  that  he  would  even  have  dissolved  the 
very  institution  of  churches,  with  every  ordinance  in  them, 
and  have  had  nothing  on  earth  but  public  worship  and  the 
Lord's  Supper.  This  peculiarity  was  akin  to  his  own  per- 
sonal reception  of  Christianity  as  a  general  economy,  unac- 
companied by  a  sufficiently  close  and  scriptural  study  of 
its  elements  with  a  sufficiently  entire  and  sole  reliance  upon 
Christ. 

But  we  find  ourselves,  in  our  survey  of  the  characteristics 
of  a  great  and  powerful  mind,  glancing  at  defective  points 
first,  which  ought  not  to  be ;  and  we  must  not  proceed, 
without  the  outlines  of  the  life  and  opinions  of  this  remark- 
able man  as  presented  in  his  letters  and  biography.  In  life 
and  character  he  was  most  lovely,  and  original  in  his  sim- 
plicity and  loveliness ;  and  this,  with  his  grand  superiority 
of  thought  and  style  to  almost  the  whole  range  of  modern 
English  literature,  makes  his  whole  genius  and  moral  ex- 
cellence so  striking,  that  it  seems  an  ungrateful  task  to 
dwell  even  upon  speculative  defects.  In  this  mine  of 
precious  metal,  the  discovery  of  a  vein  of  very  different  and 
contradictory  material  compels  us  to  a  close  examination  of 
it,  and  of  the  hidden  causes  that  might  have  produced  it. 
Many  are  the  laborers  that  have  been  working  in  this  mine, 
and  bringing  oat  whole  ingots  of  gold  for  the  manufacture 
of  their  own  pots  and  cups,  and  vessels,  who  never  dreamed, 
till  recently,  that  there  was  anything  but  gold  in  its  deep, 
curious,  far-reaching  seams  of  treasure.  We  shall  find  that 
*'  an  enemy  hath  done  this,"  and  that  it  is  one  of  the  most 
memorable  examples  of  his  infernal  and  partially  successful 
enginery. 

Mr.  Foster  was  born  in  1770.  His  father  was  a  sub- 
stantial farmer  and  weaver,  a  strong-minded  man  and 
Christian.  From  early  childhood  John  Foster  was  re- 
served and  thoughtful,  constitutionally  pensive,  full  of 
emotion  and  sentiment,  but  of  "  an  infinite  shyness"  in  the 
revelation  of  his  feelings.     As  early  as  the  age  of  twelve 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  263 

years  he  expresses  himself  as  having  had  "  a  painful  sense 
of  an  awkward  but  entire  individuality."  He  possessed  by 
nature  an  intensely  vivid  power  of  association,  combined 
with  great  strength  and  vividness  of  imagination.  He  was 
endowed  with  an  exquisite  sensibility  to  the  loveliness  and 
meaning  of  the  world  of  external  scenery.  There  was 
indeed  in  him  such  a  remarkable  combination  of  all  the 
requisites  for  a  great  poet,  that  it  seems  almost  strange 
that  the  qualities  of  his  being  had  not  run  in  that  mould. 
He  would  have  made  the  most  thoughtful  poet  that  ever 
lived. 

No  man  that  has  ever  read  it  can  have  forgotten  the  ex- 
quisitely beautiful  passage  on  the  influence  of  nature  over 
the  sensibility  and  imagination,  in  the  Essay  on  a  man's 
writing  memoirs  of  himself.  There  are  similar  passages 
in  Mr.  Foster's  Review  of  the  Philosophy  of  Nature.  His 
own  mind  was  developed  under  the  power  of  deep  impulses 
from  the  richness,  grandeur  and  beauty  of  the  creation,  and 
there  was  within  him  "  an  internal  economy  of  ideas  and 
sentiments,  of  a  character  and  a  color  correspondent  to  the 
beauty,  vicissitude,  and  grandeur,  which  continually  press 
upon  the  senses."  "  Sweet  Nature  I"  exclaims  he,  in  one 
of  his  letters,  "  I  have  conversed  with  her  with  inexpres- 
sible luxury  ;  I  have  almost  worshipped  her.  A  flower,  a 
tree,  a  bird,  a  fly,  has  been  enough  to  kindle  a  delightful 
train  of  ideas  and  emotions,  and  sometimes  to  elevate  the 
mind  to  sublime  conceptions.  When  the  Autumn  stole  on, 
I  observed  it  with  the  most  vigilant  attention,  and  felt  a 
pensive  regret  to  see  those  forms  of  beauty,  which  tell  that 
all  the  beauty  is  going  soon  to  depart."  For  this  reason 
he  would  sometimes  come  back  from  his  walks,  after  wit- 
nessing in  the  fields  some  of  the  flowers,  with  which  Nature 
prophecies  the  closing  season  of  their  loveliness,  and  say  in 
a  tone  of  sadness,  "  I  have  seen  a  fearful  sight  to-day  ;  I've 
seen  a  buttercup  I"  Though  he  took  great  delight  in 
flowers,  he  would  not  often  gather  them,  because  he  would 


264  LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

not  shorten  their  existence  ;  he  loved  to  see  them  live  out 
their  little  day. 

The  youth  of  this  being  of  such  exquisite  and  original 
genius  was  spent  mainly  in  weaving.  Till  his  fourteenth 
year  he  worked  at  spinning  wool  to  a  thread  by  the  hand- 
wheel,  and  for  three  years  afterwards  he  wove  double  stuffs 
and  lastings.  Strange  indeed  !  for  meanwhile  his  passion 
for  learning  was  such,  that  he  would  sometimes  shut  him- 
self up  in  the  barn  for  hours,  and  study  what  books  he 
could  get  hold  of,  and  then  was  tied  to  the  loom  again. 
Thus  he  was  self-educated,  sparingly,  and  not  very  favor- 
ably, until  his  seventeenth  year,  when  he  became  a  mem- 
ber of  the  Baptist  Church,  under  the  pastorship  of  the  ven- 
erable Dr.  Fawcett,  under  whose  directions  he  prosecuted 
his  theological  studies  for  a  season  at  Brearly  Hall. 

In  his  Essay  on  a  man's  writing  memoirs  of  himself, 
Mr.  Foster  has  remarked,  in  reference  to  the  effect  of  much 
and  various  reading  on  the  mind  in  its  development,  that 
"  it  is  probable  that  a  very  small  number  of  books  will  have 
the  pre-eminence  in  our  mental  history.  Perhaps  your 
memory  will  recur  promptly  to  six  or  ten  that  have  con- 
tributed more  to  your  present  habit  of  feeling  and  thought 
than  all  the  rest  together.  And  here  it  may  be  observed 
that  when  a  few  books  of  the  same  kind  have  pleased  us 
emphatically,  they  too  often  form  an  almost  exclusive  taste, 
which  is  carried  through  all  future  reading,  and  is  pleased 
only  with  books  of  that  kind."  His  own  taste  in  reading 
carried  him  much  into  the  region  of  the  romantic,  the 
imaginative  and  the  wonderful  in  history  and  character. 
He  loved  to  read  books  of  travels,  and  always  drew  illus- 
trations with  great  force  and  beauty,  from  his  excursions 
through  this  kind  of  literature.  On  a  comparison  of  his 
correspondence  with  a  volume  of  his  Essays,  a  most  strik- 
ing resemblance  will  be  found  between  the  habits  of  mind, 
the  trains  of  thinking,  reading  and  observation,  and  the 
prevailing  character  of  the  feelings,  developed  in  the  one 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  265 

and  in  the  other.  No  man  ever  drew  more  from  himself, 
in  the  composition  of  a  great  work,  or  turned  more  directly 
into  illustration  of  his  subjects  the  influences  that  had 
formed  his  own  being  and  opinions,  or  more  truly,  though 
perhaps  unintentionally,  set  down  the  great  features  of  his 
own  nature,  than  Mr.  Foster  in  the  writing  of  his  Essays. 
Milton's  Paradise  Lost  is  not  more  stamped  with  the  grand- 
eur of  his  own  mind  and  feelings,  and  the  sublimity  of  his 
imagination,  than  Foster's  Essays  with  his.  Indeed  the 
Essays  occupy  a  place  in  that  department  of  English  Lit- 
erature almost  as  separate  and  supreme  as  the  Paradise 
Lost  does  in  the  department  of  its  poetry.  In  power  of 
thought  and  style  they  are  unrivalled,  unequalled. 

Young's  Night  Thoughts  occupied  a  conspicuous  place 
among  the  books  which  attracted  Foster's  early  notice,  and 
under  the  influence  of  which  the  characteristics  of  his  mind 
were  much  formed  and  developed.  The  strain  of  gloomy 
and  profound  sublimity  in  that  poem  suited  perfectly  the 
original  bent  of  his  intellect,  the  character  of  his  imagina- 
gination,  and  his  tendencies  of  feeling,  so  that  it  wrought 
upon  him  with  a  powerful  effect.  It  even  had  much  to  do 
with  the  moulding  of  his  style,  as  well  as  the  sustaining 
and  enriching  of  his  native  sublimity  of  sentiment.  Al- 
most all  Foster's  pages  are  tinged  with  the  sombre,  thought- 
ful grandeur  of  the  night- watcher  ;  they  reflect  the  lonely 
magnificence  of  midnight  and  the  stars.  And  there  are 
images  in  Young,  which  describe  the  tenor  of  Foster's 
meditative  life,  occupied,  so  much  of  it,  with  intense  con- 
templations on  the  future  life,  in  pacing  to  and  fro  upon 
the  beach  of  that  immortal  sea,  which  brought  us  hither. 
For  no  one  ever  saw  him  but  he  seemed  to 

"  Walk  thoughtful  on  the  solemn,  silent  shore 
Of  that  vast  ocean  we  must  sail  so  soon." 


His  love  and  admiration  of  Young's  Night  Thoughts  he  car- 

f  Milt( 
12 


ried  with  him  through  life.     Of  Milton  he  remarked  that 


266  LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

"  Milton's  genius  might  barraonionsJy  have  mingled  with 
the  angels  that  announced  the  Messiah  to  be  come,  or  that 
on  the  spot  and  at  the  moment  of  his  departure  predicted 
his  coming  again."  He  held  in  great  admiration  the 
powerful  mind  of  Johnson.  His  Essays,  as  well  as  some 
of  his  Reviews,  are  such  a  proof  of  the  discriminating 
power,  taste,  and  admirable  thought  and  illustration  with 
which  he  would  pass  through  the  range  of  English  and 
Classical  literature,  especially  as  a  Christian  critic,  that 
they  make  one  wish  that  he  had  given  to  the  world  a  vol- 
ume on  the  principles  of  criticism. 

But  it  should  have  been  in  the  shape  of  original  investi- 
gations ;  for  Mr.  Foster's  Reviews,  though  full  of  profound 
thought  and  fine  illustrations,  are  not,  on  the  whole, 
equal  to  his  Essays.  He  was  limited  by  the  stufi'.  Nothing 
imposed  upon  him  as  a  task,  by  a  subject  presented  from 
abroad,  was  equal  to  what  grew  out  of  his  own  mind. 
That  was  a  region  of  thought ;  affluence  and  originality 
of  thought ;  but  it  was  spontaneous,  and  the  forms  it  must 
take  should  be  so,  too,  if  they  would  exhibit  the  whole 
power  and  originality  of  the  author.  Besides,  his  subjects 
were  often  not  congenial,  and  this  was  a  circumstance 
which  made  a  great  difi'erence  in  the  workings  of  his  genius, 
and  of  course  in  its  productions.  The  mind  may  have 
vast  original  stores  and  capacities ;  but  every  talismanic 
inscription  is  not  the  one  that  can  open  or  command  them. 
The  silk- worm  weaves  from  itself,  but  it  feeds  on  mulber- 
ries ;  it  could  not  produce  silk  from  rose  leaves  or  the 
oak.  The  aliments  of  genius  are  almost  as  important  as 
its  elements. 

The  range  of  Mr.  Foster's  theological  studies  does  not 
seem  to  have  been  comprehensive,  nor  does  he  seem  to  have 
cared  to  have  it  such ;  hating  party  systems  to  such  a 
degi'ee  as  to  be  carried  almost  into  the  opposite  extreme. 
Some  instructive  hints  as  to  unfavorable  early  associations 
connecting  themselves  with  the  system  of  Evangelical  truth 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  267 

are  to  be  found  in  the  second  and  third  of  his  letters  on  the 
aversion  of  men  of  taste  to  Evangelical  religion,  from 
which  one  may  conjecture  similar  unfortunate  influences 
to  have  operated  on  Mr.  Foster's  mind  early  in  life.  After 
he  had  finished  his  course  under  Dr.  Fawcett  at  Brearly 
Hall,  he  came  under  the  tutorship  of  Mr.  Hughes,  the 
founder  and  Secretary  of  the  British  and  Foreign  Bible 
Society,  in  the  Baptist  Seminary  at  Bristol.  Mr.  Hughes's 
mental  vigor  was  of  ''  such  a  nature,"  to  use  the  expres- 
sion of  Foster  himself,  "  as  to  communicate  a  kind  of  con- 
tagion," while  his  piety  was  deep  and  fervent. 

Foster  early  speaks  in  several  of  his  letters  of  an  ''  exces- 
sive constitutional  indolence,  which  is  unwilling  to  pur- 
chase even  the  highest  satisfaction  at  the  price  of  little 
mental  labor."  He  sometimes  washed  himself  "  engaged 
in  some  difficult  undertaking,  which  he  must  absolutely 
accomplish,  or  die  in  the  attempt."  It  was  not  an  aversion 
to  the  labor  of  hard  thinking,  but  of  writing.  It  cost  him 
severe  self-denial  and  effort  to  put  pen  to  paper.  Dr. 
Johnson  used  to  say,  a  man  can  write  at  any  time,  if  he 
will  set  himself  doggedly  to  it.  All  that  a  mind  like 
Johnson's  or  Foster's  needed  was  the  first  dogged  effort, 
and  then  the  intellectual  machinery  would  move  from  mere 
excitement. 

Mr.  Foster's  first  regular  engagement  as  a  preacher  was 
with  a  small  auditory  at  Newcastle-on-Tyne.  There  were 
some  ten  or  twelve  individuals,  who  listened  to  his  original 
discourses  with  breathless  interest,  but  he  remained  here 
little  more  than  three  months,  and  in  1793  went  to  preach 
to  a  Baptist  society  in  Dublin.  It  was  an  uncongenial 
situation,  and  he  abandoned  it  in  little  more  than  a  year, 
having  found  his  greatest  enjoyment  while  there  in  attend- 
ing to  the  children  of  a  charity  school,  to  whom  he  would 
talk  familiarly,  and  read  amusing  and  instructive  books. 
He  made  an  experiment  on  a  classical  and  mathematical 
school  in  Dublin,  and  gave  it  up  after  eight  or  nine  months. 


268  LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

His  opinions  on  religious  subjects  were  as  fluctuating  as 
his  eniployments,  and  at  one  time  he  saw  no  possibility  of 
coming  to  any  satisfactory  conclusions.  He  would  have 
liked  some  Arian  congregation  in  want  of  a  preacher,  and 
with  as  little  fixedness  of  opinion  and  as  much  uncertainty 
as  existed  in  his  own  mind,  to  employ  him  while  he  was 
halting.  Had  he  found  such  a  place,  we  might  have  had 
in  his  life  a  counterpart  to  the  early  history  of  Coleridge. 
What  would  have  exactly  gratified  him,  would  have  been 
"  the  power  of  building  a  meeting  of  his  own,  and  without 
being  controlled  by  any  man,  and  without  even  the  exist- 
ence of  what  is  called  a  church,  of  preaching  gratis  to  all 
that  chose  to  hear."  In  this  state  of  mind  he  had  "dis- 
carded the  doctrine  of  eternal  punishments." 

Here  is  something  to  be  marked.  We  have  before  us  a 
period  of  some  three  or  four  years,  from  the  age  of  twenty- 
two  to  twenty-six,  during  which  the  opinions,  the  employ- 
ments, the  expectations  and  intentions  of  Mr.  Foster  were 
utterly  unsettled.  His  course  of  reading  was  vague,  his 
course  of  study  was  rambling  and  not  disciplinary  ;  it  was 
neither  theological  nor  literary,  but  embraced  projections 
for  both.  Sometimes  for  a  year  he  did  not  preach  at  all. 
Sometimes  he  taught  the  classics  and  mathematics.  Some- 
times he  preached  in  cleric  cloth,  sometimes  in  ''  tail  and 
colored  clothes,"  sometimes  of  a  Saturday  evening  perused 
Dr.  Moore's  Journal  of  a  residence  in  France,  and  "  ad- 
justed some  of  the  exteriors  for  the  morrow,"  and  on  Sab- 
bath morning  made  his  sermon  in  bed,  ''  caught  some  con- 
siderable ideas,"  and  ascended  the  pulpit.  "  I  seem  nearly 
at  a  stand  with  respect  to  the  adjustment  of  plans  for  futu- 
rity. Whether  I  am  to  be  a  preacher  or  not,  I  cannot 
tell." — "  At  some  moments  of  life,  the  world,  mankind,  re- 
ligion, and  eternity,  appear  to  me  like  one  vast  scene  of 
tremendous  confusion,  stretching  before  me  far  away,  and 
closed  in  shades  of  the  most  awful  darkness  ; — a  darkness 
which  only  the  most  powerful  splendors  of  Deity  can  illu- 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  269 

mine,  and  which  appears  as  if  they  never  yet  had  illumined 
it." 

Now  it  is  during  these  three  or  four  years,  not  so  much 
of  the  transition,  as  of  the  chaotic  state,  in  Mr.  Foster's 
life,  that  we  find,  amidst  all  his  uncertainties,  one  sudden 
and  positive  declaration,  "  I  have  discarded  the  doctrine 
of  eternal  punishments P  He  adds,  "  I  can  avow  no  opin- 
ion on  the  peculiar  points  of  Calvinism,  for  I  have  none, 
nor  see  the  possibility  of  forming  a  satisfactory  one."  The 
discarded  doctrine  seems  to  have  been  cashiered  by  Mr.  Fos- 
ter with  about  as  little  thoughtful  investigation,  as  if  he 
had  been  laying  aside  an  old  coat.  The  sudden  announce- 
ment of  this  negative  position  is  almost  the  only  positive 
thing  to  be  found  in  these  three  or  four  years  of  his  experi- 
ence. He  was  some  twenty-four  years  of  age.  If  this  was 
the  manner  in  which  he  decided  upon  the  fundamental  ar- 
ticles of  that  Christian  System  which  he  was  preaching,  it 
is  manifest  that  his  theological  views  could  have  been  but 
little  worth.  This  announcement  of  opinion  has  an  ab- 
ruptness, an  isolation,  a  dislocation  from  every  train  of  asso- 
ciation and  employment,  which  intimates  a  hasty  prejudice, 
rather  than  a  deliberately-formed  conviction.  He  seems  to 
have  discarded  the  clerical  dress  and  the  clerical  doctrine 
with  about  the  same  independence  and  indifference  ;  but  in 
neither  case  as  an  absolute  conviction.  If,  however,  his 
denial  of  this  grand  prominent  feature  in  the  Christian  sys- 
tem is  to  be  traced  back  to  this  period,  it  is  manifestly  a 
denial  not  based  upon  any  profound  or  protracted  examina- 
tion of  the  subject. 

Having  passed  through  tliis  period,  we  find  Mr.  Foster, 
in  1797,  accepting  an  invitation  to  become  the  minister  of 
a  Baptist  Church  in  Chichester.  This  is  one  year  after  the 
preceding  declaration  of  opinion.  After  he  has  been  preach- 
ing two  years  at  Chichester,  we  find  him  saying  to  his 
friend  Mr.  Hughes,  that  "  he  holds,  he  believes,  accurately, 
the  leading  points  of  Calvinistio  faith ;  as  the   corruption 


270  LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

of  human  nature,  the  necessity  of  a  divine  power  to  change 
it,  irresistible  grace,  the  influence  of  the  Spirit,  the  doctrine 
of  the  atonement  in  its  most  extensive  and  emphatic 
sense,"  &c.,  &c.  "  My  opinions  are,  in  substance,  Cal- 
vinistic."  It  would  seem  that  the  moment  Mr.  P^oster  be- 
gan to  apply  himself  in  earnestness,  and  with  fixedness  of 
purpose,  to  the  duties  of  the  ministry,  his  mind  began  to 
be  settled  in  the  great  truths  of  the  gospel.  For  two  years 
and  a  half,  his  biographer  tells  us,  he  "  applied  himself  with 
greater  earnestness  than  at  any  former  period  to  his  minis- 
terial duties,  usually  preaching  three  times  on  the  Sunday, 
and  in  various  ways  striving  to  promote  the  piety  and  gen- 
eral improvement  of  the  congregation.-'  The  result  to  him- 
self is  full  of  instruction.  No  longer  left  to  vague  indeter- 
minate musings  and  readings,  the  continued  effort  to  teach 
and  improve  others  wrought  a  salutary  correction  and  de- 
cisiveness in  his  own  convictions. 

His  intercourse  with  his  former  tutor,  Mr.  Hughes,  was 
of  the  greatest  benefit.  The  views  and  facts  presented  by 
this  gentleman  were  dwelt  upon  by  Mr.  Foster  with  "  great 
emotion."  In  a  letter  to  his  parents  in  1799,  he  speaks 
with  frankness.  "  My  visit  to  Mr.  Hughes  has  been  of 
great  service  in  respect  of  my  religious  feelings.  He  has 
the  utmost  degree  of  evangelic  animation,  and  has  inces- 
santly, with  affectionate  earnestness  in  his  letters,  and 
still  more  in  his  personal  intercourse,  acted  the  monitor  on 
this  subject.  It  has  not  been  in  vain.  I  have  felt  the  com- 
manding force  of  the  duty  to  examine  and  judge  myself 
with  a  solemn  faithfulness.  In  some  measure  I  have  done  so, 
and  I  see  that  on  this  great  subject  I  have  been  wrong.  The 
views  which  my  judgment  has  admitted  in  respect  to  the 
gospel  in  general,  and  Jesus,  the  great  pre-eminent  object 
in  it,  have  not  inspired  my  affections,  in  that  animated,  un- 
bounded degree,  which  would  give  the  energy  of  enjoyment 
to  my  personal  religion,  and  apostolic  zeal  to  my  ministra- 
tions among  mankind.     This  fact  is  serious,  and  moves  my 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  271 

deep  regrets.  The  time  is  come  to  take  on  me  with  stricter 
bonds  and  more  affectionate  warmth,  the  divine  disciple- 
ship.  I  fervently  invoke  the  influences  of  Heaven,  that  the 
whole  spirit  of  the  gospel  may  take  possession  of  all  my 
soul,  and  give  a  new  and  powerful  impulse  to  my  practical 
exertions  in  the  cause  of  the  Messiah." 

'^  My  opinions  are  more  Calvinistic  than  when  I  first 
came  here ;  so  much  so  as  to  be  in  direct  hostility  with 
the  leading  principles  of  belief  in  this  society.  The 
greatest  part  of  my  views  I  believe  are  accurately  Calvin- 
istic. My  opinion  respecting  future  punishments  is  an  ex- 
ception." 

We  shall  resume  the  consideration  of  this  latter  point, 
in  a  particular  examination  of  the  tenor  of  Mr.  Foster's 
mind  and  writings  with  reference  to  it.  It  was  a  most 
strange,  unaccountable,  and  to  many  persons  a  startling 
announcement,  that  some  of  the  letters  in  these  volumes 
proved  the  author  of  them  to  have  renounced  the  Scripture 
truth  of  the  endless  punishment  of  the  wicked.  We  shall 
see  how  the  thing  lay  in  his  mind ;  how,  while  his  whole 
belief  and  practical  course  was  evangelical,  there  was  on 
this  point  a  break  in  the  chain  ;  his  convictions  kept  the 
continuity,  while  a  doubting,  inconsistent,  and  impatient 
logic  denied  it.  It  was  like  an  arch  kept  in  its  position 
and  form  without  the  key-stone,  by  the  frame  on  which  it 
was  constructed;  that  frame  being  in  Foster's  mind  an 
uninterrupted  spiritual  conviction  and  pressure  of  personal 
guilt  and  of  eternal  realities.  To  see  him  in  company 
with  the  deniers  and  scoffers  of  the  eternal  sanctions  of  the 
Divine  law,  would  be  as  if  Abdiel  had  been  found  fighting 
by  mistake  in  the  army  of  the  fallen  angels. 

We  have  seen  his  convictions  becoming  more  and  more 
Calvinistic.  An  extract  from  a  letter  to  Rev.  Dr.  Fawett, 
in  the  year  1800,  is  here  in  point ;  written  apparently,  in 
part,  with  reference  to  the  change  of  opinion  noted  in  the 
letter  to  his  parents. 


272  LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

*'  I  receive  with  pleasure,  but  not  without  diffidence  of 
myself,  yoar  congratulations  on  a  happy  revolution  of  my 
views  and  feelings.  Oh,  with  what  profound  regret  I  re- 
view a  number  of  inestimable  years  nearly  lost  to  my  own 
happiness,  to  social  utility,  and  to  the  cause  and  kingdom 
of  Christ !  I  often  feel  like  one  who  should  suddenly 
awake  to  amazement  and  alarm  on  the  brink  of  a  gloomy 
gulf.  I  am  scarcely  able  to  retrace  exactly  through  the 
mingled  dreary  shades  of  the  past,  the  train  of  circumstan- 
ces and  influences  which  have  led  me  so  far  astray ;  but 
amid  solemn  reflection,  the  conviction  has  flashed  upon  me 
irresistibly,  that  I  nmst  be  fatally  wrong.  This  mournful 
truth  has  indeed  many  times  partially  reached  me  before, 
but  never  so  decisively,  nor  to  awaken  so  earnest  a  desire 
for  the  full,  genuine  spirit  of  a  disciple  of  Jesus.  I  see 
clearly  that  my  strain  of  thinking  and  preaching  has  not 
been  pervaded  and  animated  by  the  evangelic  sentiment, 
nor  consequently  accompanied  by  the  power  of  the  gospel, 
either  to  myself  or  to  others.  I  have  not  come  forward  in 
the  spirit  of  Paul,  or  Peter,  or  John ;  have  not  counted  all 
things  but  loss,  that  I  might  win  Christ,  and  be  found  in 
him.  It  is  true,  indeed,  that  this  kind  of  sentiment,  when 
strongly  presented,  has  always  appealed  powerfully  to  both 
my  judgment  and  my  heart ;  I  have  yielded  my  whole 
assent  to  its  truth  and  excellence,  and  often  longed  to  feel 
its  heavenly  inspiration ;  but  some  malady  of  the  soul  has 
still  defeated  these  better  emotions,  and  occasioned  a  mourn- 
ful relapse  into  coldness  of  feeling,  and  sceptical  or  un- 
profitable speculation.  I  wonder  as  I  reflect;  and  am 
amazed  how  indifference  and  darkness  could  return  over  a 
mind,  which  had  seen  such  gleams  of  heaven.  I  hope  that 
mighty  grace  will  henceforward  save  me  from  such  infe- 
licity. My  habitual  aflections,  however,  are  still  much  be- 
low the  pitch  that  I  desire.  I  wish  above  all  things  to  have 
a  continual,  most  solemn  impression  of  the  absolute  need 
of  the  free  salvation  of  Christ  for  my  own  soul,  and  to  have 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  273 

a  lively  faith  in  him,  accompanied  with  all  the  sentiments 
of  patience,  humility,  and  love.  I  would  be  transformed, 
fired  with  holy  zeal ;  and  henceforth  live  not  to  myself,  but 
to  him  that  died  and  rose  again.  My  utmost  wish  is  to  be 
a  minor  apostle  ;  to  be  an  humble,  but  active,  devoted,  he- 
roic servant  of  Jesus  Christ,  and  in  such  a  character  and 
course  to  minister  to  the  eternal  happiness  of  those  within 
my  sphere.  My  opinions  are  in  substance  decisively  Cal- 
vinistic.  I  am  firmly  convinced,  for  instance,  of  the  doc- 
trines of  original  sin,  predestination,  imputed  righteousness, 
the  necessity  of  the  Holy  Spirit's  operation  to  convert  the 
mind,  final  perseverance,  &c.,  &c." 

Such  letters  as  these  afford  convincing  proof  that  the 
mind  of  the  writer  was  under  the  influence  of  that  Divine 
Grace,  of  which  he  asserts  the  necessity  in  the  soul.  They 
afford  proof  equally  convincing,  of  the  disastrous  nature  of 
those  tendencies,  whatever  they  may  have  been,  under 
which  Mr.  Foster  found  himself  "  on  the  brink  of  a  gloomy 
gulf;"  and  which,  as  we  shall  see,  continued,  notwith- 
standing the  endearing  openness  and  meekness  with  which 
he  received  the  severe  suggestions  and  remonstrances  of 
inferior  minds,  to  harass  and  fetter  his  spirit.  The  tracing 
of  these  causes  in  their  operation,  so  far  as  it  can  be  done 
even  with  any  degree  of  probability,  is  a  matter  of  much 
importance. 

Yet  it  seems,  we  say  again,  an  ungrateful  and  presump- 
tuous work  to  analyze  the  defects  or  obliquities  in  the 
religious  character  of  a  man  of  sincere  piety,  and  of  such 
vast  endowments  ;  though  the  picture  is  before  the  world, 
and  there  are  reasons  for  a  severe  scrutiny  of  it.  It  seems 
still  more  ungrateful  to  take  the  ingenuous  confession  of 
Mr.  Foster's  own  mind,  which  are  in  themselves  such  a 
delightful  evidence  of  genuine  childlike  humility,  in  cor- 
roboration of  a  judgment  passed  upon  his  deficiencies.  But 
if  Mr.  Foster  had  the  frankness  and  humility  of  a  little  child, 
he  had  also  an  entire  freedom  from  anything  like  morbid- 

12* 


274  LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

ness  of  conscience  ;  if  he  had  a  perfect  ingenuousness  of 
character,  he  had  also  a  strong  protection,  in  his  hatred  of 
hypocrisy  and  cant,  against  overdrawing  any  of  the  deficien- 
cies of  that  character ;  he  would  be  likely  to  set  down 
things  just  as  they  are,  or  at  least  just  as  they  appeared  to 
him  on  discovering  them.  We  use  the  freedom  of  those, 
who  have  followed  Foster's  intellect  as  a  guiding  star ; 
who  well  remember  the  time  when,  as  if  some  gorgeous 
angel  had  come  to  them  to  lead  them  on  in  paths  of  truth 
never  before  opened,  they  remained  as  it  were  spellbound 
by  the  grandeur  of  the  vision.  And  now,  if  the  same 
angel  beckons  them  on  towards  a  tract  of  error,  they  are 
right,  if  they  scrutinize  most  severely  the  elements  of  an 
intellectual  and  spiritual  development,  assuming  so  un- 
expectedly such  a  direction  ;  elements,  every  one  .of  which 
they  were  prepared  at  one  time  to  take  even  on  trust  as 
well-nigh  perfect. 

In  1799,  Mr.  Foster  wrote  a  deeply-interesting  letter  to 
his  friend  Hughes,  in  acknowledgment  of  the  justness  and 
kindness  of  a  preceding  letter,  which  had  been  painful  to 
him  by  the  severity  of  its  friendly  strictures.  "  I  know  it 
too  well,"  he  says,  "  that  for  a  long  course  of  time,  during 
which  I  have  felt  an  awful  regard  for  religion,  my  mind 
has  not  been  under  the  full  immediate  impression  of  its 
most  interesting  character,  the  most  gracious  of  its  influ- 
ences, its  evangelic  beams.  I  have  not,  with  open  face, 
beheld  the  transforming  glory  of  the  Lord.  I  have,  as  it 
were,  worshipped  in  the  outer  courts  of  the  temple,  and 
not  habitually  dwelt  in  that  sacred  recess,  where  the  God 
of  love  reveals  all  himself  in  Jesus  Christ.  And  is  it  diffi- 
cult to  believe  that  in  advancing  towards  a  better  state,  I 
may  be  accompanied  awhile  by  some  measure  of  the  defects 
and  the  shades  contracted  in  that  gloomy  sojourn,  which  I 
must  forever  deplore  ?" 

The  state  of  his  mind,  while  in  that  gloomy  sojourn, 
may  be  partially  gathered  from  a  letter  in  1798.     He  speaks 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  275 

of  *'  the  whole  hemisphere  of  contemplation  as  inexpressibly- 
strange  and  mysterious.  It  is  cloud  pursuing  cloud,  forest 
after  forest,  Alps  upon  Alps.  It  is  in  vain  to  declaim 
against  scepticism ;  I  feel  with  an  emphasis  of  conviction, 
wonder  and  regret,  that  all  things  are  almost  enveloped  in 
shade,  that  many  things  are  covered  with  thickest  darkness, 
that  the  number  of  things  to  which  certainty  belongs  is 
small.  I  hope  to  enjoy  the  sunshine  of  the  other  world. 
One  of  the  very  few  things  that  appear  to  me  not  doubtful, 
is  the  truth  of  Christianity  in  general ;  some  of  the  evi- 
dences of  which  I  have  lately  seen  most  ably  stated  by 
Archdeacon  Paley,  in  his  work  on  the  subject." 

This  is  surely  a  sad  state  for  a  preacher  of  the  Gospel. 
Say  what  you  will  of  it,  it  argues  a  most  defective  religious 
experience,  the  defects  and  shades  of  which  did  indeed  ac- 
company Mr.  Foster,  in  some  degree,  all  through  life.  It 
could  not  have  been  otherwise,  without  a  great  and  power- 
ful change,  and  he  was  not  entirely  delivered  from  the 
malady  of  which  he  speaks  in  those  letters.  His  mind  was 
veiled  ;  the  shades  remainded  upon  it. 

But  if  Mr.  Foster  had  passed  eftectually  and  thoroughly 
through  such  a  state  of  mind  as  this,  and  had  come  out 
from  it,  by  the  grace  of  God,  in  reliance  submissively  upon 
his  Word,  into  the  clear  light  of  the  Cross,  and  of  the  love 
of  Christ  in  the  soul,  it  would  have  been  to  him  a  discipline 
of  incomparable  worth.  If  he  had  wrestled  out,  as  Bunyan 
did  from  his  conflicts,  with  no  possibility  of  peace,  and  a 
determination  of  having  no  peace,  but  in  Christ  and  in  God^s 
Word,  it  had  been  an  element  of  power  and  light.  But 
instead  of  this,  he  never  entirely  passed  out  of  it  into  the 
clear  light ;  he  carried  the  involving  folds  of  this  gloom,  in 
which  sometimes  he  seemed  to  take  a  grim  pleasure  in 
wrapping  himself,  even  to  the  end  of  life.  He  was  always 
in  some  respect  in  the  Valley  of  the  Shadow  of  Death, 
and  exclaiming  with  Job,  ''  He  hath  set  darkness  in  my 
path."     He   never  seems   to  have  felt,   as  such   a  strongs 


276  LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

mind  ought  to  have  done,  the  amazing  importance  of  being 
settled  concerning  the  particular  revelations  of  the  Chris- 
tian religon,  by  an  unhesitating  reception  and  most  prayer- 
ful study  of  the  Word  of  God.  And  his  mind  seemed 
sometimes  obstinately  to  turn  av^^ay  from,  and  forget,  the 
light  shed  as  a  flood  from  that  Word  upon  the  future  dis- 
pensation of  our  being,  to  lose  itself  in  conjectures,  mys- 
terious, solemn,  awful,  as  if  everything  beyond  the  grave 
were  absolutely  unknown  to  us.  His  feeling  in  reference 
to  the  future  world  was  much  like  that  of  Job,  "  Before  I 
go  whence  I  shall  not  return,  eveu  to  the  land  of  darkness, 
and  the  shadow  of  death  ;  a  land  of  -darlvness  as  darkness 
itself,  and  of  the  shadow  of  death  without  any  order,  and 
where  the  light  is  as  darkness."  Certainly  his  prevaihng 
mood  was  much  more  this,  than  that  of  Paul ;  and  his 
prevailing  mode  of  reasoning  on  some  points  was  rather 
that  of  a  mind  under  the  dimness  of  the  old  dispensation 
than  the  glory  of  the  new. 

He  speaks,  about  this  same  period,  in  a  letter  to  Mr. 
Fawcett,  of  his  having  "for  a  long  while  past  fully  felt 
the  necessity  of  dismissing  subtle  speculations  and  dis- 
tinctions, and  of  yielding  an  humble,  cordial  assent  to  the 
mysterious  truth,  just  as  and  because  the  scriptures  declare 
it,  without  inquiring,  how  can  these  things  be  ?"  But  it 
is  evident  that  in  some  respects  he  never  did  this,  and  that 
his  mind  was  continually  relapsing  from  the  health  and 
definiteness  of  divine  revelation,  into  a  state  of  vague, 
solemn,  awful  wonder,  as  to  what  he  called  the  absolute 
unknown  beyond  the  grave,  the  mysteries  of  that  dread 
eternal  hereafter.  As  an  instance  of  this  state  of  mind  we 
may  take  the  following  paragraph  from  one  of  his  letters, 
written  even  so  late  as  the  year  1834. 

"It  does  always  appear  to  me  very  unaccountable  (among 
indeed  so  many  other  inexplicable  things),  that  the  state  of 
the  soul  after  death  should  be  so  completely  veiled  from  our 
serious  inquisitiveness.     That  in  some  sense  it  is  proper 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTPIR.  277 

that  it  should  be  so,  needs  not  be  said.  But  is  not  the 
sense  in  which  it  is  so,  the  same  sense  in  which  it  is  proper 
there  should  be  punitive  circumstances,  privations,  and 
inflictions,  in  this  our  sinful  state  ?  For  one  knows  not 
how  to  believe  that  some  revelation  of  that  next  stage  of 
our  existence  would  not  be  more  influential  to  a  right  pro- 
cedure in  this  first,  than  such  an  absolute  unknown.  It  is 
true  that  a  profound  darkness,  which  we  know  we  are  des- 
tined ere  long  to  enter,  and  soon  to  find  ourselves  in  an 
amazing  light,  is  a  striking  object  of  contemplation.  But 
the  mind  stiil,  again  and  again  falls  back  from  it  dis- 
appointed and  uninstructed,  for  want  of  some  defined 
forms  of  reality  to  seize,  retain,  and  permanently  occupy 
it.  In  default  of  revelation,  we  have  to  frame  our  conjec- 
tures on  some  principle  of  analogy,  which  is  itself  arbitrary, 
and  without  any  means  of  bringing  it  to  the  test  of  reason." 
Now  one  is  tempted  to  exclaim,  in  perusing  such  a  pas- 
sage, Can  the  man  who  writes  this  have  ever  seriously  read 
the  Scriptures  ?  It  may  be  said  that  Foster  was  not  here 
speaking  of  the  general  doctrine  of  a  future  state  of  rewards 
and  punishments,  but  of  the  default  of  any  definite  knowl- 
edge of  our  state  immediately  after  death.  But  even  thus, 
such  language  is  absolutely  unjustifiable  on  the  ground  of 
the  information  contained  in  the  Word  of  God,  and  would 
seem  totally  inconsistent  with  a  firm  faith  in  the  truth,  or 
a  serious  examination  of  the  meaning,  of  our  blessed  Lord's 
own  declarations  as  to  what  takes  place  after  death.  There 
is  no  such  thing  as  this  absolute  unknown^  of  which  Foster 
speaks  ;  on  the  contrary,  the  blank  is  so  definitely  filled  up, 
the  mystery  is  so  much  cleared  away,  that  our  Lord  sol- 
emnly declares  to  us  that  if  men  will  not  believe  for  what 
is  already  written,  neither  would  they  be  persuaded,  though 
one  rose  from  the  dead.  A  sentence  which  stands  in  sin- 
gular and  palpable  contradiction  against  what  Mr.  Foster 
remarks  about  some  revelation  being  more  influential.  He 
has  introduced  a  similar  train  of  reflections  in  one  of  his 


278 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 


Essays,  but  with  a  very  different  impression.  But  he  seems 
to  have  been  constantly  wishing  for  something  more  clear 
and  convincing  than  we  have  in  the  Word  of  God,  in  re- 
gard to  the  realities  of  the  Eternal  World,  and  constantly 
underrating  the  degree  and  decisiveness  of  that  information  ; 
or  what  is  worse,  shrinking  back  from  its  admission,  and 
dreading  its  plain  and  direct  interpretation.  Nothing  can 
be  more  unfortunate  than  such  a  state  of  mind  in  regard  to 
the  Scriptures,  especially  for  a  preacher  of  the  Gospel ;  and 
few  things  would  render  a  teacher  more  unfitted  for  the  in- 
struction of  others,  in  regard  to  some  of  the  most  essential 
points  in  the  system  of  revealed  truth. 

His  state  of  mind  was  somewhat  like  that  of  a  disastrous 
eclipse,  and  all  things  looked  in  it  as  the  vegetation  and 
forms  of  the  world  look  in  an  eclipse  of  the  sun  at  noonday. 
It  seemed  as  if,  while  he  was  adv^ancing  forward  to  the 
knowledge  of  Divine  things,  the  knowledge  of  the  glory  of 
God  in  the  face  of  Jesus  Christ,  and  to  the  possession  of 
convictions  and  expanded  views  and  a  celestial  experience, 
which  would  have  armed  him  as  with  the  sword  of  Michael 
against  the  powers  of  darkness,  there  had  been  a  strange 
permission  given  to  those  powers  to  stop  him.  And  they 
said.  We  cannot  take  from  him  what  he  has  gained,  but 
we  will  fasten  him  there ;  he  shall  henceforward  view  all 
things  only  from  his  present  limited  point  of  view,  and  here 
we  will  bring  to  bear  upon  him  all  our  suggestions  of  mys- 
teries and  difficulty,  and  if  we  cannot  turn  him  from  his 
integrity,  we  will  make  the  very  anguish  and  utterance  of 
his  uncertainties  the  means  of  shaking  others.  And  he 
shall,  at  the  least,  never  make  any  onset  upon  our  king- 
dom, notwithstanding  the  towering  pride  of  his  intellect, 
and  the  grace  of  God  in  him.  And  in  effect,  Foster  did 
for  a  season  stop.  He  seems  for  a  long  time  to  have  made 
little  advance  in  religious  knowledge,  and  little  in  religious 
zeal.  His  life  was  always  pure,  his  nature  noble,  and  his 
spirit  was  always  hovering  over  the  awful  gulf  of  futurity, 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  279 

and  you  might  see  a  gloomy  and  terrible  light  reflected  from 
the  wings  uf  the  soul,  as  you  followed  its  excursions ;  but 
you  could  seldom  see  it  in  the  clear  serene  of  heaven.  You 
saw  not  the  shining  light  shining  more  and  more,  unto  the 
perfect  day,  but  a  path  of  involutions  and  anxieties,  some- 
times indeed  running  in  that  shining  light,  but  sometimes 
crossing  it  at  right  angles  and  plunging  into  the  darkness. 
His  feelings  were  of  an  exquisite  kindness  and  tenderness  ; 
his  sympathies  were  strong  and  deep,  notwithstanding  his 
apparently  misanthropic  aloofness  from  society.  His  hu- 
mility was  genuine,  his  personal  reliance  upon  Christ,  to- 
wards the  close  of  life,  delightfully  entire  and  satisfactory ; 
and  yet  for  a  long  period  there  was  doubt  and  gloom. 

The  position  of  his  mind  seemed  like  that  of  a  man  in 
the  dark,  confident  that  he  is  near  some  vast,  solid  obstacle, 
but  not  daring  to  advance.  He  had  a  spiritual  sense  or 
instinct  of  the  realities  of  the  future  world,  like  the  feeling 
which  makes  a  blind  man  know  that  things  are  near  him, 
even  without  touching  them.  And  he  trembled  at  times, 
as  a  bewildered  traveller  might  stand  and  tremble  in  the 
darkness,  when  convinced  by  the  deep  roar  of  falling  waters 
near  and  below  him,  that  he  is  on  the  brink  of  some  tre- 
mendous verge,  where  he  dare  not  stir  one  step  without  a 
guide.  What  avail  would  it  be  for  him  in  such  a  case,  to 
shout  to  others,  who  might  be  in  the  same  position.  There 
is  nothing  to  fear,  the  gulf  is  not  bottomless,  and  if  you  fall, 
you  will  come  up  unhurt !  Why  fear  for  thyself,  O  man, 
if  thou  art  so  sure  of  the  divine  benevolence  at  the  bottom 
of  this  fall  to  others  ?  This  fear  is  the  sacred  instinct  of 
the  soul  in  the  near  presence  of  the  reality.  Though  the 
soul  does  not  see,  or  will  not  see,  the  form  of  the  reality  in 
the  definite  light  of  the  Divine  Word,  yet  it  feels  the  reality 
almost  as  if  it  touched  it. 

It  was  under  the  power  of  this  feeling  that  Foster  lived 
and  wrote.  His  very  letters  issue  from  the  pressure  of  it ; 
every  coinage  of  his  mind  bears  its  stamp.     He  could  nc*-, 


280  LIFE    AND    AVRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

help  it,  any  more  than  he  could  the  sense  of  his  immortality. 
There  was  always  in  his  soul  a  sense  of  vast,  dread,  inim- 
itable retribution  in  eternity,  to  which  all  sinful  beings 
are  advancing,  and  from  which  the  only  escape  is  in  the 
mercy  of  God  in  Christ  Jesus  to  those  only  who  in  this 
world  avail  themselves  of  it.  He  felt  this ;  he  could  not, 
did  not,  reason  about  it ;  he  felt  it.  He  questioned  it,  and 
yet  he  felt  it.  He  shrunk  back  from  it,  and  yet  he  felt  it. 
It  was  with  him  by  day  and  by  night,  an  ever-brooding 
power  and  presence  from  the  Eternal  World,  a  truth  that 
woke  to  perish  never,  "  a  master  o'er  a  slave  ;  a  presence 
that  was  not  to  be  put  by."  Beneath  the  pressure  of  ques- 
tioned realities  in  the  invisible  world  he  wrote  all  his  works, 
and  they  have,  consequently,  some  of  them,  an  overpower- 
ing solemnity.  For  he  could  not  put  off  his  heritage  ;  his 
soul  would  be  weighed  down  beneath  it,  notwithstanding 
all  evasive  doubts  and  shrinkings  from  its  dread  solemnity. 
There  was  within  him 

"  That  eye  among  the  blind, 
That,  deaf  and  silent,  read  the  eternal  deep, 
Haunted  forever  by  the  Eternal  mind." 

And  amidst  all  the  uncertainties  of  his  religious  expe- 
rience, and  all  the  vagueness  of  his  views,  perhaps  there 
never  was  a  man,  who  had  a  fuller,  more  constant,  brooding 
sense  of  eternity,  as  a  sense  of  eternal  responsibility,  and  a 
danger  of  eternal  ruin.  And  although  custom  lies  upon 
our  religious  sensibilities,  if  they  be  not  most  anxiousl}^ 
cultivated,  with  a  weight,  as  men  advance  into  age,  "heavy 
as  frost,  and  deep  almost  as  life,"  no  religious  deadness  or 
insensibility  or  laxity  of  view  ever  delivered  Foster  from 
this  powerful  haunting  sense  of  eternal  retribution.  We 
think  we  can  detect  it  even  in  that  late  letter  on  the  sub- 
ject of  the  Divine  penalty,  even  while  summoning  all  his 
powers  to  resist  the  conviction.  A  letter,  not  indeed  writ- 
ten in  anything  like  the  dotage  of  the  mind  in  old  age,  for 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  281 

Foster  never  lived  to  that,  but  bore  his  faculties  with  sur- 
prising vigor,  beyond  his  three-score  years  and  ten ;  but 
still  written  when  the  wheel  is  beginning  to  cease  its  revo- 
lutions at  the  cistern,  and  when  they  that  look  out  at  the 
windows  be  darkened.  A  letter  full  of  the  most  surprising 
inconsistencies,  of  which  the  impression  remaining  on  the 
mind  is  that  of  a  being  crushed  beneath  some  heavy  load, 
and  writhing  in  vain  to  get  out  from  it. 

The  manner  of  Mr.  Foster's  reasoning  in  that  letter, 
combined  with  the  tenor  of  his  practical  appeals  to  the 
conscience  in  his  writings,  reminds  us  irresistibly  of  what 
he  himself  has  said  to  the  "  professed  disbelievers  in  the 
Christian  revelation  of  an  imaginary  heaven,  and  an  equally 
fictitious  hell."  "You  must  allow  me  to  doubt,  whether 
you  really  feel  in  this  matter  all  the  confident  assurance 
which  you  pretend.  I  suspect  there  are  times,  when  you 
dare  not  look  out  over  that  field,  for  fear  of  seing  the  por- 
tentous shapes  there  again ;  and  even  that  they  sometimes 
come  close  to  present  a  ghastly  visage  to  you  through  the 
very  windows  of  your  stronghold.  I  have  observed  in  men 
of  your  class,  that  they  often  appear  to  regard  the  arrayed 
evidences  of  revealed  religion,  not  with  the  simple  aversion 
which  may  be  felt  for  error  and  deception,  but  with  that 
kind  of  repugnance  which  betrays  a  recognition  of  adverse 
poiver.'''' 

Just  so  the  argument  of  Foster  against  the  Scripture 
view  of  the  eternity  of  future  punishments,  betrays  not  so 
much  a  persuasion,  as  the  existence  of  agonizing  doubt, 
and  the  recognition  of  adverse  power. 

We  question  if  this  will  not  also  strike  the  mind  in 
reading  his  letter  to  Dr.  Harris,  in  which  he  speaks  of  the 
transcendently  direful  nature  of  a  contemplation  of  the  human 
race,  if  he  believed  the  doctrine  of  the  eternity  of  future  mis- 
ery ;  and  speaks  also  of  the  "  short  term  of  mortal  existence, 
absurdly  sometimes  denominated  a  probation.^''  Mr.  Foster, 
in  writing  this,  must  have  absolutely  forgotten  what  he 


282 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 


himself  wrote  in  his  introduction  to  Doddrige's  Rise  and 
Progress,  in  regard  to  that  very  probation,  and  the  short- 
ness of  it,  and  under  this  very  denomination  of  a  proha- 
tionary  state.  He  tells  the  careless  man  with  the  most 
overwhelming  pressure  of  solemnity  he  can  bring  to  bear 
upon  his  spirit,  to  '•  think  of  that  existence  during  endless 
ages,  an  existence  to  commence  in  a  condition  determined 
for  happiness  or  misery  by  the  state  of  mind  which  shall 
have  been  formed  in  this  introductory  period.''''  "The 
whole  term  of  life,  diminutive  as  it  is  for  a  preparatory  in- 
troduction to  that  stupendous  sequel,  is  what  our  Creator 
has  allotted  to  us,  leaving  to  us  no  responsibility  that  it  is  not 
longer."  And  Mr.  Foster  draws  from  the  actual  shortness 
of  the  preparatory  time  at  the  uttermost,  an  argument,  not 
against  the  goodness  of  God,  but  for  the  conscience  of  the 
guilty  man,  to  convince  him  of  the  infinite  madness  of 
making  it  any  shorter,  of  wasting  any  portion  of  it.  Ho 
tells  the  man  of  the  world  of  the  rapidity  of  the  course  with 
which  he  is  passing  out  of  life,  rejecting  from  him  all  care 
of  life's  one  grand  business,  the  preparation  for  an  eternal 
state.  He  tells  him  that  he  is  madly  living  as  if  this  life 
had  no  connection  with  that  future  life,  and  as  if  that 
future  life  would  have  ''  no  reference  or  relation  to  the  pre- 
vious and  PROBATIONARY  statc."  He  adjures  the  idea  of 
ETERNITY  to  ovcrwhclm  that  spirit,  whose  whole  scheme 
of  existence  embraces  but  a  diminutive  portion  of  time. 
He  calls  for  the  scene  of  the  last  judgment  to  present  itself 
in  a  glare  to  the  being  whose  conscience  is  in  such  awful 
repose.  Let  the  thought  of  the  A\m\g\\iy  fulminate  on  the 
mind  of  that  mortal  ! 

Here  assuredly  is  that  state  most  distinctly  recognized, 
and  the  solemnity  of  it  with  great  power  enforced,  as  a 
probationary  state,  which  Mr.  Foster,  at  a  later  period, 
declared  to  be  absurdly  denominated  a  probation.  But  it 
was  "  in  his  haste"  that  he  said  it.     We  pass  to  a  sketch 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  283 

of  the  succeeding  portion  of  his  life  before  resuming  this 
subject. 

In  the  year  1800  Mr.  Foster  removed  to  Downend, 
about  five  miles  from  Bristol,  where  he  preached  regularly 
at  a  small  chapel  erected  by  Dr.  Caleb  Evans.  Here  he 
resided  about  four  years,  and  then,  "  in  consequence  chiefly 
of  the  high  testimony  borne  to  his  character  and  abilities 
by  Mr.  Hall,  he  was  invited  to  become  the  minister  of  a 
Congregation  meeting  in  Shepard's  Barton,  Frome."  He 
removed  thither  in  February,  1804,  and  in  1805  his  great 
work,  indeed  the  work,  on  which,  as  a  grave  profound 
classic  in  English  Literature,  his  fame  rests,  was  published. 
He  was  now  thirty-five  years  of  age.  At  this  time  a  swel- 
ling in  the  thyroid  gland  of  the  neck  compelled  him  for  a 
season  to  relinquish  preaching,  and  he  gave  up  his  charge, 
and  devoted  himself  with  much  assiduity  to  a  literary  en- 
gagement as  contributor  to  the  Eclectic  Review.  "  So 
fully  was  he  occupied  in  this  department  of  literature,  that 
upwards  of  thirteen  years  elapsed,  before  he  again  appeared 
before  the  public  in  his  own  name." 

In  1808  he  was  married  to  an  admirable  lady  of  con- 
genial mind  and  feeling,  to  whom  he  had  been  engaged  for 
five  years.  From  the  period  of  his  marriage  he  lived  a 
number  of  years  at  Bourton,  a  village  in  Gloucestershire, 
with  a  good  deal  of  work  and  much  serene  domestic  happi- 
ness. Though  not  settled  in  the  ministry,  he  was  preach- 
ing nearly  every  Sabbath,  once  or  twice,  for  about  seven 
years.  In  1817  he  became  once  more  a  resident  and  stated 
preacher  at  Downend,  though  for  a  few  months  only.  In 
1818  he  delivered  his  Discourse  on  Missions.  His  sermon 
in  behalf  of  the  British  and  Foreign  School  Society,  de- 
livered the  same  year,  was  afterwards  enlarged  into  the 
powerful  Essay  on  the  Evils  of  Popular  Ignorance,  and 
published  in  1820.  In  1821  he  removed  from  Downend  to 
Stapleton,  within  three  miles  of  Bristol,  and  in  1822,  at 
the  earnest  solicitation  of  his  friends  in  Bristol,  commenced 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

a  series  of  fortnight  lectures  in  Broad  mead  Chapel.  His 
preparations  for  these  lectures  have  been  printed  since  his 
death,  and  contain  some  of  the  finest  productions  of  his 
genius.  He  continued  these  lectures  somewhat  longer  than 
two  years,  but  on  the  settlement  of  Robert  Hall  at  Bristol 
he  relinquished  the  engagement  as,  in  his  own  view,  "  alto- 
gether superfluous,  and  even  bordering  on  impertinent." 
He  observed  that  he  should  have  very  little  more  preaching, 
probably,  ever,  but  should  apply  himself  to  the  mode  of 
intellectual  operation,  of  which  the  results  might  extend 
much  further,  and  last  much  longer. 

In  the  year  1825  he  wrote  one  of  his  most  important 
and  powerful  essays,  the  Introduction  to  Doddridge's  Rise 
and  Progress  of  Religion.  On  occasion  of  the  death  of  Mr. 
Hall,  '^  a  preacher,''  said  Foster,  "  whose  like  or  equal  will 
come  no  more,"  instead  of  preaching  the  funeral  sermon, 
which  he  declined  by  medical  interdict,  he  published,  in 
1832,  his  Observations  on  Mr.  Hall  as  a  preacher,  in  con- 
nection with  Dr.  Gregory's  Memoir  of  his  life. 

In  a  letter  to  Mr.  Fawcett,  in  1830,  he  says,  "  Pray,  do 
you  often  preach  ?  I  have  suffered  an  almost  entire  de- 
position from  that  office,  by  physical  organic  debility  as  the 
primary  cause,  and  as  an  occasional  one  by  choice,  from 
having  felt  the  great  inconvenience  and  laboriousness  of 
doing  occasionally  what  I  have  been  so  long  out  of  the 
practise  of ;  so  that  for  a  long  time  past  I  have  declined 
wholly  our  city  pulpits,  and  never  go  higher  than  an  easy 
unstudied  discourse,  now  and  then,  in  one  or  two  of  the 
neighboring  country  villages,  where  there  is  a  stated  min- 
istry. Mr.  Hall  is  in  high  physical  vigor  for  the  age  of  66, 
while  often  suffering  severely  the  inexphcable  pain,  in  his 
back,  of  which  he  has  been  the  subject  from  his  childhood. 
His  imagination,  and  therefore  the  splendor  of  his  elo- 
quence, has  considerably  abated,  as  compared  with  his 
earlier  and  his  meridian  pitch,  but  his  intellect  is  in  the  high- 


i 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  285 

est  vigor  ;  and  the  character  of  his  preaching  is  that  of 
the  most  emphatically  evangelical  piety." 

Of  Foster's  own  last  discourse  in  the  series  of  fortnight 
lectures,  he  announces  the  subject  thus :  "I  had  a  splendid 
subject — the  three  Methodists  of  Babylon,  in  the  fiery  fur- 
nace ;  and  perhaps  I  thought,  and  perhaps  some  of  the 
auditors  thought,  that  I  did  it  tolerable  justice."  What 
would  we  not  have  given  to  have  heard  that  sermon  ! 

In  1832  Mr.  Foster's  estimable  and  beloved  wife  was 
taken  from  him,  and  thenceforward  the  ten  years  of  favor, 
added  to  his  three-score,  were  to  be  passed  in  great  loneli- 
ness. His  "  old  and  most  excellent  friend  Hughes"  was 
also  taken  in  1833.  "  But  for  having  looked  to  see  the 
day  of  the  month,"  says  he,  "  in  order  to  date  this  letter, 
the  day  would  have  passed  off  without  my  being  aware 
that  it  is  the  day  that  completes  my  sixty-third  year,  what 
is  denominated  the  grand  climacteric.  I  deeply  deplore 
not  having  lived  to  worthier  purpose,  both  for  myself 
and  others  ;  and  earnestly  ho})e  and  pray,  that  whatever 
of  life  remains  may  be  employed  much  more  faithfully  to 
the  great  end  of  existence.  But  with  this  self-condemning 
review,  and  with  nothing  but  an  uncertain,  and  possibly 
small  remainder  of  life  in  prospect,  how  emphatically  op- 
pressive would  be  the  conscious  situation,  if  there  were  not 
that  great  propitiation,  that  redeeming  sacrifice,  to  rest 
upon  for  pardon  and  final  safety." 

We  have  spoken  of  Foster's  constitutional  and  habitual 
horror  of  the  labor  of  writing.  It  could  not  have  been 
imagined,  till  the  publication  of  these  volumes  of  letters, 
what  an  amazing  amount  of  time  and  labor  he  spent  in 
the  work  of  revision,  remoulding  and  condensing,  and 
sometimes  amplifying  his  sentences.  The  new  edition  of 
his  Essays  on  Popular  Ignorance  was  in  effect  re- written  ; 
he  made  a  new  work  of  it ;  and  the  revision  occupied  him 
several  months.  For  weeks  he  says  he  was  at  it,  "  with- 
out intermission  or  leisure  to  read  a  newspaper,  review  or 


tRP 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    POSTER. 


anything  else,"  having  never  undergone  the  same  quantity 
of  hard  labor  within  the  same  number  of  weeks  together 
in  his  whole  life.  "  My  principle  of  proceeding  was  to 
treat  no  page,  sentence  or  word  with  the  smallest  cere- 
mony ;  but  to  hack,  split,  twist,  prune,  pull  up  by  the 
roots,  or  practise  any  other  severity  on  whatever  I  did  not 
like.  The  consequence  has  been  alterations  to  the  amount, 
very  likely,  of  several  thousands."  "  It  is  a  sweet  luxury, 
this  book-making ;  for  I  dare  say  I  could  point  out  scores 
of  sentences,  each  one  of  which  has  cost  me  several  hours 
of  the  utmost  exertion  of  my  mind  to  put  it  in  the  state  in 
which  it  now  stands,  after  putting  it  in  several  other  forms, 
to  each  one  of  which  I  saw  some  precise  objection,  which 
I  could  at  the  time  have  very  distinctly  assigned.  And  in 
truth  there  are  hundreds  of  them  to  which  I  could  make 
objections  as  they  now  stand,  but  I  did  not  know  how  to 
hammer  them  into  a  better  form."  We  must  confess  we 
wish  that  instead  of  so  much  of  this  revising  work,  Mr. 
Foster  had  spent  the  same  amount  of  labor  on  some  addi- 
tional production. 

This  kind  of  labor,  so  much  of  it,  was  not  necessary  for 
the  perfection  of  his  work,  as  is  manifest  from  the  consid- 
eration of  his  gi-eatest  production,  the  Essays,  which  do 
not  seem  to  have  been  thus  labored,  and  are  in  fact  in  a 
more  perfect  style.  The  Essay  Introductory  to  Doddridge's 
work  was  written  by  Mr.  Foster,  according  to  his  own  ac- 
count, as  a  mere  task,  a  piece  of  hard,  unwilling,  compul- 
sory labor,  throughout ;  a  perfect  fag.  He  had  made  the 
contract  for  it  with  the  bookseller  ;  it  was  so  long  unful- 
filled, that  the  whole  edition  of  Doddridge  lay  upon  the 
shelves  of  the  warehouse  for  years,  unbound,  waiting  for 
the  promised  Essay,  much  to  the  damage  of  the  publish- 
ers. He  had  himself  a  very  poor  opinion  of  the  work,  to 
which  he  was  actually  driven  by  dint  of  expostulations  and 
remonstrances,  and  he  says  "  it  was  almost  all  labored  un- 
der a  miserable  feeling  of  contraction  and  sterility."     And 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  287 

yet  it  is  one  of  the  most  powerful  Essays  in  the  language, 
and  it  sparkles  with  illustrations,  which  are  the  result  of 
profound  thought  and  a  Miltonic  imagination  wrestling  to- 
gether, while  it  is  pervaded,  more  than  any  other  of  Fos- 
ter's writings,  by  the  solemnity  of  the  Retributions  of 
Eternity.  A  man  who  could  write  thus  on  compulsion 
ought  to  have  written  more  abundantly  of  his  own  free 
will. 

But  perhaps  the  happiest  example  of  Foster's  fineness, 
originality,  and  affluence  of  suggestive  thought  in  connec- 
tion with  a  powerful  imagination,  are  to  be  found  in  what 
is  called  in  the  biography,  his  Journal.  This  is  a  series 
of  striking  reflections,  observations,  and  analogies,  extended 
over  a  number  of  years,  and  marked  to  the  amount  of  some 
eight  or  nine  hundred.  They  are  not  all  given  by  his  bio- 
grapher ;  some  hundreds  seem  to  be  omitted  ;  for  what  rea- 
son we  cannot  tell.  Certainly,  articles  which  had  been 
prepared  and  left  on  record  by  Mr.  Foster  himself,  with 
great  care,  must  have  been  far  more  worthy  of  publication 
than  so  strange  and  inconsistent  a  letter  as  the  one  to  a 
young  minister,  which  the  writer  himself,  could  he  have 
been  questioned  as  to  its  publication,  would  probably  have 
condemned  to  the  flames.  On  what  principle  any  part  of 
the  Journal  is  kept  back,  while  the  letter  is  published,  we 
cannot  imagine.  The  pages  occupied  with  this  Journal  are 
among  the  most  intensely  interesting,  vivid,  and  suggestive 
portions  of  the  volume.  The  observations  seem  often  to  be 
the  result  of  a  whole  day's  experience,  or  study,  or  self- 
reflection,  or  inspection  of  others,  or  meditation  on  the  pro- 
cesses of  nature,  in  a  single  sentence ;  reminding  us  of  a 
remark  once  made  by  Dr.  Chalmers  in  answer  to  a  ques- 
tion put  to  him  by  a  foreigner.  What  is  John  Foster  now 
about  ?  "  Why,  sir,  he  is  thinking  as  intensely  as  ever  he 
can,  at  the  rate  of  about  a  sentence  a  week."  The  analo- 
gies and  illustrations  are  like  flashes  of  light,  in  their  sud- 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

denness,  vnth  the  illumination  remaining  as  the  steady  light 
of  day. 

/  The  massive  hardihood  and  sternness  of  thought  distin- 
guishing all  Mr.  Foster's  writings  is  owing  in  great  measure 
to  the  gloomy  depth  and  accuracy  with  which  he  had 
gauged  the  boundlessness  of  human  depravity.  If  there 
was  one  fact  that  had  the  mastery  over  his  mind,  and  col- 
ored all  its  delineations,  it  was  that  of  the  desperate  and 
black  corruption  of  our  nature.  No  man  saw  more  clearly, 
or  painted  more  strongly  and  impressively,  the  native  pre- 
dominant evils  of  the  heart  and  of  society.  Instinctively 
he  stripped  olT  all  disguises,  and  at  a  touch  what  was  fair 
to  the  outside  appeared  full  of  rottenness.  There  reigned 
in  his  soul  an  indignant  contempt  of  all  forms  of  pride  and 
hypocrisy,  and  of  all  cajoling  of  the  race  into  a  complacent 
sense  of  goodness,  conveyed  sometimes  in  sentences  of 
^withering  sarcasm,  sometimes  in  instances,  as  points,  from 
which  the  malignity  and  intensity  of  supreme  evil  seem  to 
hiss  off,  as  it  were,  into  the  atmosphere.  He  keeps  up  in 
delineations  with  the  furrow  of  fiery  ruin  laid  open  by  the 
Apostle  to  the  Gentiles.  He  was  the  first  to  unveil  to  the 
English  nation  the  frightfulness  of  an  education  in  such  de- 
pravity ;  to  bring  out  into  notice  the  hideous  features  of  a 
race  of  children,  who  "  know  no  good  that  it  is  to  have  been 
endowed  with  a  rational  rather  than  a  brute  nature,  except- 
ing that  they  thus  have  the  privilege  of  tormenting  brutes 
with  impunity." 

The  work  on  the  Evils  of  Popular  Ignorance  is  in  many 
respects  the  greatest  of  Foster's  works  ;  it  shows  to  best 
advantage  the  comprehensiveness  of  his  views,  the  prodig- 
ious strength  of  his  mind,  and  the  intense  energy  with 
which  it  worked,  on  a  subject  that  possessed  his  soul  with 
a  sense  of  its  importance.  For  its  burning,  impetuous, 
cataractical,  yet  grave  and  steadfast  tide  of  description ;  for 
the  concentration  and  continuity  of  an  impression  gloomy 
as  night ;  for  the  overwhelming  power  with  which  it  takes 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  289 

the  convictions  as  by  storm  ;  for  the  strength  and  almost 
ferocious  energy  of  its  blows,  blow  after  blow,  as  if  you 
saw  a  giant  sweating  at  his  anvil,  as  if  it  were  Vulcan 
forging  the  armor  of  Achilles,  it  has  no  instance  to  be 
brought  in  comparison.  For  the  manner  in  which  the 
strength  of  the  EngUsh  language  is  tasked  in  its  combina- 
tions to  express  the  conceptions  of  the  writer,  there  is  no- 
thing but  some  pages  in  the  Paradise  Lost  to  be  placed  be- 
fore it.  There  are  passages  in  it,  which  make  the  same 
impression  on  the  mind  as  Milton's  description  of  hell,  or 
of  the  Messiah  driving  the  rebellious  angels  out  of  heaven. 
In  all  English  literature  it  were  vain  to  look  for  passages 
of  greater  power,  than  the  author's  delineations  of  the  abom- 
inations of  Popery,  and  of  Pagan  depravity  and  misery. 
And  there  are  other  passages  of  equal  sublimity  and  power 
of  imagination  in  more  captivating  exercise. 

The  paragraph  on  the  effect  of  a  conscience  darkened 
in  ignorance,  or  almost  gone  out  as  the  inward  light  and 
law  of  the  being,  is  one  of  the  most  striking  instances  of 
the  grand  part  which  Foster's  imagination  was  made  to 
play  in  the  exhibition  of  his  subjects. 

*'  As  the  man  moves  hither  and  thither  on  the  scene,  he 
has  his  perception  of  what  is  existing  and  passing  on  it ;  there 
are  continually  meeting  his  senses  numberless  moving  and 
stationary  objects  ;  and  among  the  latter  there  are  many 
forms  of  limitation  and  interdiction ;  there  are  high  walls 
and  gates  and  fences,  and  brinks  of  torrents  and  precipices  ; 
in  short,  an  order  of  things  on  all  sides  signifying  to  him, 
with  more  or  less  of  menace, — Thus  far  and  no  farther.  And 
he  is  in  a  general  way  obsequious  to  this  arrangement. 
We  do  not  ordinarily  expect  to  see  him  carelessly  violating 
the  most  decided  of  the  artificial  lines  of  warning-ofF,  nor 
darting  across  those  dreadful  ones  of  nature.  But  the 
wliile^  as  he  is  nearhj  destitute  of  that  faculty  of  the  soul 
which  would  perceive  (analogously  to  the  effect  of  coming' 
in  contact  with  something  charged  tvith    thai  element 

13 


2m 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 


which  causes  the  lightning)^  the  mvful  interceptive  lines 
of  that  other  arrangement,  luhich  he  is  in  the  midst  of  as 
a  subject  of  the  laws  of  God,  ive  see  vjith  what  insensi- 
hility  he  can  transgress  those  prohibitory  significations  of 
the  Almighty  will,  ivhich  are  to  devout  men  as  lines 
streaming  with  an  infinitely  more  formidable  than  mate- 
rial fire.  And  if  we  look  towards  his  futnre  course  of 
life,  the  natural  sequel  foreseen  is,  that  those  lines  of  divine 
interdiction,  which  he  has  not  conscience  to  perceive  as 
meant  to  deter  him,  he  will  seem  nevertheless  to  have 
through  his  corruptions,  a  strong  recognition  of,  but  in 
another  quality, — as  temptations  to  attract  him." 

From  about  the  period  of  his  sixtieth  year,  Mr.  Foster 
prepared  little  or  nothing  for  the  press.  His  last  article  in 
the  Eclectic  Review  was  published  in  1839.  From  the 
year  1806  to  that  period  be  had  written  one  liundred  and 
eighty-five  articles :  sixty-one  of  these  were  collected  and 
published  in  two  volumes  by  Dr.  Price,  the  Editor  of  the 
Eclectic,  only  twenty  of  which  have  been  republished 
in  this  country.  From  the  year  1830  we  see  the  mind  of 
this  great  writer  mainly  in  his  letters.  They  are  filled  with 
profound,  solemn,  interesting  feeling  and  thought.  He  took 
great  interest  in  political  affairs,  though  necessarily  a 
gloomy  view.  He  had  a  most  profound  sense  of  the  despe- 
rate depravity  and  selfishness  of  j^olitical  intrigues,  and  an 
intense  hatred  of  the  domineering  perniciousness  of  the 
Establishment. 

In  what  manner  the  shades  of  solemnity  were  folding 
and  deepening  over  his  soul  in  the  prospect  of  the  eternal 
world,  and  what  was  the  ground  of  his  hope  for  pardon 
and  blessedness,  in  "  the  grand  Futurity,''''  a  few  short  ex- 
tracts from  his  letters  will  strikingly  show.  They  reveal  a 
solemn  anxiety  inconsistent  with  that  dismissal  of  the  doc- 
trine of  eternal  punishment,  of  which  we  are  to  speak. 
"  Whatever  may  be  our  appointed  remaining  time  on 
earth,"  says  he,  in  a  letter   in  1836,  ''  we  are  sure  it  is 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  291 

little  enough  for  a  due  preparation  to  go  safely  and  happily 
forward  into  that  eternal  hereafter."  In  1837,  speaking  of 
the  death  of  a  friend,  "  I  have  regretted  to  understand  that 
she  was  a  confirmed  Socinian — greatly  regretted  it ;  for  it 
does  appear  to  me  a  tremendous  hazard  to  go  into  the  other 
world  in  that  character.  The  exclusion  from  Christianity 
of  that  which  a  Socinian  rejects,  would  reduce  me  instantly 
to  black  despair.''''  "It  is  fearful  to  think  what  the  final 
account  must  be  at  the  award  of  infallible  Justice,  for  the 
immense  multitude  of  accountable  creatures." 

In  a  letter  of  retrospection,  to  a  dear  friend,  in  1840,  he 
says,  "The  pain  of  a  more  austere  kind  than  that  of  pen- 
siveness  is  from  the  reliection  to  how  little  purpose,  of  the 
highest  order,  the  long  years  here,  and  subsequently  else- 
where, have  been  consumed  away — how  little  sedulous  and 
earnest  cultivation  of  internal  piety — how  little  even  mental 
improvement — how  little  of  zealous  devotement  to  God 
and  Christ,  and  the  best  cause.  Oh,  it  is  a  grievous  and 
sad  reflection,  and  drives  me  to  the  great  and  only  resource, 
to  say,  God  be  merciful  to  me  a  sinner !  I  also  most  ear- 
nestly implore  that  in  one  way  or  another  what  may  remain 
of  my  life  may  be  better,  far  better,  than  the  long  pro- 
tracted past.  PAST  !  What  a  solemn  and  almost  tremen- 
dous word  it  is,  when  pronounced  in  the  reference  in  which 
I  am  repeating  it !" 

In  1841,  confined  with  illness,  he  says,  "  The  review  of 
life  has  been  solemnly  condemnatory — such  a  sad  deficiency 
of  the  vitality  of  religion,  the  devotional  spirit,  the  love, 
the  zeal,  the  fidelity  of  conscience.  I  have  been  really 
amazed  to  think  how  I  could — I  do  not  say  have  been,  con- 
tent with  such  a  low  and  almost  equivocal  piety,  for  I  never 
have  been  at  all  content — but,  how  I  could  have  endured 
it  without  my  whole  soul  rising  up  against  it,  and  calling 
vehemently  on  the  Almighty  Helper  to  come  to  my  rescue, 
and  never  ceasing  till  the  blessed  experience  was  attained. 
And  then  the  sad  burden  of  accumulated  guilt !  and  the 


292 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 


solemn  future  !  and  liie  so  near  the  end  I  O,  what  dark 
despair  but  for  that  blessed  light,  that  shines  from  the 
Prince  of  Life,  the  only  and  the  all-sufficient  Deliverer 
from  the  second  death.  I  have  prayed  earnestly  for  a  gen- 
uine penitential,  living  faith  on  him."  "  There  is  much 
work  yet  to  be  done  in  this  most  unworthy  soul ;  my  sole 
reliance  is  on  Divine  assistance,  and  I  do  hope  and  earn- 
estly trust  (trust  in  that  assistance  itself),  that  every  day 
I  may  yet  have  to  stay  on  earth  will  be  employed  as  part  of 
a  period  of  persevering  and  I  may  almost  say  passionate 
petitions  for  the  Divine  mercy  of  Christ,  and  so  continue 
to  the  last  day  and  hour  of  life,  if  consciousness  be  then 
granted." 

Again,  in  1842,  "  Within  and  without  are  the  admoni- 
tions that  life  is  hastening  to  its  close.  I  endeavor  to  feel 
and  live  in  conformity  to  this  admonition ;  greatly  dissatis- 
fied with  myself  and  my  past  life,  and  having  and  seeking 
no  ground  of  hope  for  hereafter,  but  solely  the  all-sufficient 
merits  and  atonement  of  our  Lord  and  Saviour.  If  that 
great  cause  of  faith  and  hope  were  taken  away,  I  should 
have  nothing  left." 

In  October,  1843,  the  very  month  of  his  death,  he  says 
to  a  friend,  "  I  have  now  not  the  smallest  expectation  of 
surviving  a  very  few  months.  The  great  and  pressing  busi- 
ness is  therefore  to  prepare  for  the  event.  That  is,  in  truth, 
our  great  business  always ;  but  is  peculiarly  enforced  in  a 
situation  like  mine.  It  involves  a  review  of  past  life  ;  and 
oh,  how  much  there  is  to  render  reflection  painful  and 
alarming.  Such  a  review  would  consign  me  to  utter  de- 
spair, but  for  my  firm  belief  in  the  all-sufficiency  of  the 
mediation  of  our  Lord."  In  his  last  letter  to  Mr.  Hill,  he 
says,  "  What  would  become  of  a  poor  sinful  soul,  but  for 
that  blessed,  all-comprehensive  sacrifice,  and  that  interces- 
sion at  the  right  hand  of  the  Majesty  on  High  ?" 

Of  the  same  affecting  and  solemn  character  was  the  tenor 
of  his  last  conversations.     He  frequently  spoke  of  the  value, 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  293 

of  prayer,  and  often  turned  the  conversation  on  the  sub- 
ject of  the  separate  state.  "After  the  death  of  any  friend, 
he  seemed  impatient  to  be  make  acquainted  with  the  secrets 
of  the  invisible  world.  On  one  occasion  of  this  kind,  rather 
more  than  a  twelvemonth  before  his  own  decease,  he  ex- 
claimed, They  don't  come  back  to  tell  us !  and  then,  after 
a  short  silence,  emphatically  striking  his  hand  upon  the 
table,  he  added,  with  a  look  of  intense  seriousness.  But  we 
shall  know  some  time.'''' 

"  Speaking  of  his  weakness,  to  one  of  his  two  servants, 
who  had  lived  with  him  for  about  thirty  years,  he  mentioned 
some  things,  which  he  had  not  strength  to  perform ;  and 
then  added.  But  I  can  pray,  and  that  is  a  glorious  thing. 
On  another  occasion  he  said  to  his  attendant.  Trust  in 
Christ,  trust  in  Christ  ?  On  another  time  the  servant  heard 
him  repeating  to  himself  the  words,  O  death,  where  is  thy 
sting?  O  grave  where  is  thy  victory?  Thanks  be  to  God, 
who  giveth  us  the  victory,  through  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ." 
Thus  in  the  night,  entirely  alone,  but  Christ  with  him, 
October  16th,  1843,  all  that  was  mortal  of  a  being  most 
"fearfully  and  wonderfally  made,"  slept  peacefully,  and 
expired. 

We  must  now  recur  to  that  grand  subject  of  interest  in 
these  volumes,  on  which  we  have  already  dwelt  in  part. 
We  have  referred  to  Mr.  Foster's  letter  to  a  young  minister 
on  the  eternity  of  future  punishments,  in  which  he  attempted 
what  he  called  a  moral  argument  against  it.  This  letter 
was  written  so  late  as  the  year  1841.  But  in  the  mean- 
time, what  shall  we  say  of  the  moral  argument  in  support 
of  it,  all  the  while  working  itself  out  in  Mr.  Foster's  per- 
sonal convictions  as  to  the  sole  ground  of  safety  in  eternity, 
and  enforced  so  powerfully,  with  such  impressive,  such 
awful  solemnity  in  some  of  his  writings  ?  What  a  strange 
and  unaccountable  inconsistency  for  such  a  man  in  his  let- 
ters, in  his  spontaneous  convictions,  in  his  practical  writings, 
to  be  speaking  of  the  second  deaths  of  the  inevitableness  of 


294  LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

despair  without  reliance  upon  Christ,  of  the  perdition  in 
eternity,  except  there  be  that  rehance,  and  at  the  same  time 
instituting  an  argument,  according  to  which  thfere  is  really 
no  second  death,  there  can  be  no  such  thing  as  despair,  and 
no  possibility  of  perdition  !  According  to  which,  if  a  man 
had  asked  Mr.  Foster,  "  Sir,  what  is  that  second  death,  of 
which  you  speak?"  he  must  have  answered,  "I  know 
nothing  about  it,  except  that  it  is  not  eternal,  but  is  a  mere 
introduction  into  everlasting  life  !"  What  has  a  man  to  do 
with  despair,  who  believes  that  the  whole  human  race  will 
be  everlastingly  blessed,  and  who,  if  he  reasons  closely,  will 
have  to  acknowledge  that  any  prior  discipline  of  human 
misery  would  but  enhance  the  rapture  of  the  blessedness, 
and  might  actually  be  a  thing,  in  the  long  run,  to  be 
chosen  ? 

The  inconsistency  of  which  we  speak,  appears  more  mar- 
vellous still,  on  comparing  the  letter  to  a  young  minister 
with  Mr.  Foster's  Introductory  Essays  to  Doddridge's  Rise 
and  Progress  of  Religion  in  the  Soul.  It  would  scarcely 
have  been  imagined  that  two  productions,  so  dissimilar,  so 
contrary,  could  have  proceeded  from  the  same  writer.  The 
whole  solemuity  and  power  of  the  Essay  is  owing  to  the 
doctrine  of  an  endless  retribution  ;  take  that  away,  and  it 
is  as  a  gaseous  jelly,  which  sparkled  with  phosphorescence 
in  the  night,  but  becomes  a  cold  putrid  pulp  in  the  day. 
Take  away  the  belief  of  the  reader  in  the  writer's  deep  per- 
sonal convictions  of  the  truth  of  what  he  is  uttering,  and 
you  disenchant  his  pages  of  their  power.  It  is  the  belief 
that  the  consequences  impending  are  eternal,  that  creates 
that  power.  The  very  blade  of  Mr.  Foster's  keen  weapon 
was  forged  in  the  fires  of  that  endless  perdition,  which,  in 
the  letters  to  a  young  minister,  he  denies  ;  its  handle 
sparkles  with  gems  that  flash  forth  the  warnings  of  insuf- 
ferable ruin.  He  bids  the  soul  tremble  at  the  thought  of 
dying  unprepared ;  he  makes  it  acknowledge  that  the 
"  entirely  depending  interest  of  its  futurity  is  vast  and 


LIFE    AND    WHITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  295 

eternal."  He  bids  it  think  of  that  existence  during  endless 
ages, — an  existence  to  commence  in  a  condition  determined 
for  happiness  or  misery  by  the  state  of  mind  which  shall 
have  been  formed  in  this  introductory  period.  He  bids  it 
regard  the  melancholy  phenomenon  of  a  little  dependent 
spirit,  voluntarily  receding  from  its  beneficent  Creator, 
directing  its  progress  away  from  the  eternal  source  of  light, 
and  life,  and  joy,  and  that  on  a  vain  presumption  of  being 
under  the  comet's  law,  of  returning  at  last  to  the  sun  ! 

He  bids  the  man  of  the  world  remember  that  nothing 
will  be  gained,  and  all  be  lost,  by  refusing  to  think  of  it. 
He  tells  him  that  a  preparation  to  meet  God  is  that  one 
thing,  of  which  the  failure  is  perdition.  He  tells  him  that 
no  tempest  nor  shook  of  an  earthquake  would  affright  him 
so  much  as  this  horrible  neglect  of  his  eternal  salvation,  if 
it  could  be  suddenly  revealed  to  him  in  full  light.  He 
speaks  of  the  supreme  interest  of  his  existence,  and  of  the 
whole  question  of  safety  or  utter  jruin,  as  depending.  He 
speaks  of  the  necessity  now  of  "  applying  to  the  soul  the 
redeeming  principle,  without  which  it  will  perish."  He 
speaks  of  the  madness  of  delay.  ^'  The  possibility  of  dying 
unprepared  takes  all  the  value  from  even  the  highest  proba- 
bility that  there  will  be  prolonged  time  to  prepare  ;  plainly, 
because  there  is  no  proportion  between  the  fearfulness  of 
such  a  hazard,  and  the  precariousness  of  such  a  depend- 
ence." He  tells  man  that  his  corrupt  nature,  if  untrans- 
formed  in  this  world,  must  be  miserable  in  the  next.  He 
tells  him  that  the  subject  is  one  which  he  cannot  let  go, 
"  without  abandoning  himself  to  the  dominion  of  death." 
And  he  arrays  the  melancholy  spectacle  of  a  "  crowd  of 
human  beings  in  prodigious,  ceaseless  stir  to  keep  the  dust 
of  the  earth  in  motion,  and  then  to  sink  into  it,  while  all 
beyond  is  darkness  and  desolation !" 

Now  what  is  the  meaning  of  all  this  ?  To  suppose  that 
these  solemn  adjurations  were  used  merely  to  keep  up  an  ap- 
pearance of  belonging  to  the  orthodox  faith  on  this  subject, 


296  LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN  FOSTER. 

would  be  revolting  in  the  extreme  ;  it  would  make  the  reader 
throw  the  book  from  him  in  contempt  and  disgust ;  but  to 
suppose  that  the  author  used  such  language  because,  though 
he  himself  did  not  believe  the  truth  which  it  would  be  held 
to  convey,  he  nevertheless  thought  it  would  make  the  book 
more  impressive — would  be  very  little  better.  And  what 
would  have  been  the  effect,  if  the  author  had  prefaced  the 
work  with  something  like  the  following  announcement: — 
The  writer  of  these  pages  does  not  believe  in  the  doctrine 
assumed  in  the  work  to  which  they  are  introductory, 
namely,  that  the  retributions  of  eternity  are  eternal,  and 
holds  very  different  ideas  as  to  the  mercy  of  the  Universal 
Father,  from  those  ordinarily  held  by  the  divines  of  Dr. 
Doddridge's  mode  of  thinking.  Nevertheless,  something 
was  necessary  to  give  the  work  a  credit  and  currency  with 
those  who  hold  his  opinions ;  and  besides,  it  must  be  con- 
fessed, that  nothing  but  the  idea  of  eternal  consequences 
is  of  any  weight  either  to  bring  men  to  religion  or  to  keep 
them  from  vice. 

The  effect  of  such  a  declaration,  should  the  reader  of 
the  work  keep  it  in  view,  would  be  almost  ludicrous,  if  the 
subject  itself  were  not  to  solemn  for  such  an  emotion ;  it 
would  be  powerfully  neutralizing  as  to  any  deep  impression; 
nor  could  any  statement  as  to  the  author's  belief  in  limited 
punishment  retain  under  any  efficacious  impulse  of  amend- 
ment, the  careless  hearts  to  which  the  work  was  directed. 
It  would  be  like  attempting  to  hold  a  ship,  that  is  dragging 
her  anchor  in  a  storm,  by  a  kedge  attached  to  her  bul- 
warks. 

What  shall  we  say  of  the  conflicting  states  of  mind  re- 
vealed in  Mr.  Foster's  intensely  interesting  epistolary  biog- 
raphy, and  intensely  powerful  practical  writings  on  this 
great  subject  ?  From  the  age  of  seventy  we  must  revert 
back  to  the  seed-time  of  his  opinions,  and  we  shall  find  the 
noxious  root  of  a  plant  exhaling  poison  that  grew  into  ob- 
stinate toughness,  in  spite  of  the  accompanying  growth  of 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  297 

all  gracious  herbs.  We  have  seen  that  Mr.  Foster's  mind, 
richly  endowed  as  it  was,  seemed  to  make  a  disastrous 
paase  in  the  comparative  twilight  of  Divine  truth.  He 
seems  to  have  felt  it  himself.  And  the  clue  to  a  solution 
in  part  may  be  found  in  the  21st  letter  in  the  biographical 
collection,  in  which  Foster  says  he  has  just  been  reading 
an  author,  "  who  maintains  with  very  great  force  of  reason- 
ing, that  no  man  could,  in  any  situation,  have  acted  differ- 
ently from  what  he  has  done."  "  Though  I  do  not  see  how 
to  refute  his  argument,"  says  Foster,  "  I  feel  as  if  I  ought 
to  differ  from  his  opinion.  He  refers  to  Jonathan  Edwards 
as  a  powerful  advocate  of  the  same  doctrine.  He  says 
such  an  expression  as,  I  will  exert  myself,  is  absurd.  It  is 
an  expression  which,  notwithstanding,  I  am  inclined  to 
repeat,  as  I  view  the  wide  field  of  duty  before  me." 

That  this  book  had  a  lasting  effect  upon  Foster's  state 
of  mind  and  trains  of  opinion,  is  manifest  from  a  letter 
written  about  a  year  after  this  date,  in  which  he  runs  the 
circle  of  the  reasoning  of  a  perfet  Necessitarian,  and  con- 
soles himself,  amidst  his  despairing  views  of  the  wretched 
state  of  man,  with  the  maxim,  Whatever  is,  is  right.  "If 
sin  be  traced  up  to  its  cause,"  says  he,  "  that  cause  will  be 
found  to  have  been — the  nature  and  state  of  man;  but  this 
cause  was  precisely  so  fixed  by  the  Creator,  and  evidently 
with  a  determination  that  this  fatal  consequence  should 
follow ;  or  he  fixed  it  so^  that  he  saw  this  consequence 
most  certainly  would  follow.  He  who  fixed  the  first  great 
moving  causes,  appointed  all  their  effects  to  the  end  of  the 
world.  Whatever  is,  is  right.  Thus,  regarding  God  as 
strictly  the  cause  of  all  things,  I  am  led  to  consider  all 
things  as  working  his  high  will ;  and  to  believe  that  there 
is  neither  more  nor  less  evil  in  the  world  than  he  saw  accu- 
rately necessary  toward  that  ultimate  happiness,  to  which 
he  is  training,  in  various  manners,  all  his  creatures.  In  this 
view,  too,  I  can  sometimes   commit  myself  to  his  hands, 

13* 


298  LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.^ 

with  great  complacency,  certain  that  he  will  do  for  me,  in 
all  respects,  that  which  is  the  best." 

Now  this  reasoning  was  precisely  that  which  might  well 
have  led  to  utter  and  disastrous  Universalism.  But  Foster 
was  saved  from  that,  though  he  here  seems  ready  to  throw 
himself,  and  his  whole  system  of  theology,  into  the  central 
involutions  of  the  chain  of  necessity  from  eternity.  The 
theory  that  sin  is  the  necessary  means  of  the  greatest  good, 
involved,  in  a  mind  like  Foster's,  such  a  palpable  accusa- 
tion of  the  Divine  benevolence,  that  while  writhing  in  the 
folds  of  that  moral  anaconda,  there  was  no  resource  to  his 
soul,  shrinking  from  the  fatal  consequence,  but  to  throw 
himself  on  the  conclusion,  that  since  men  were  of  necessity 
sinners  for  the  greatest  good,  they  would  be  also  of  neces- 
sity saved,  for  the  greatest  happiness ;  God,  the  author  of 
this  system,  would  conduct  it  safely  to  its  end,  and  tliere- 
fore  the  anxious,  self-accusing,  self-condemned  mortal, 
might,  at  times,  under  the  comfort  of  being  a  certain  link 
in  the  chain  of  Necessity,  commit  himself  v/ith  great  com- 
placency into  God's  hands.  The  whole  chain  passes  indeed 
through  the  medium  of  sin,  but  it  is  only  to  come  out 
brighter  in  the  atmosphere  of  eternal  glory. 

If  this  was,  at  any  time,  any  prominent  source  of  Foster's 
complacency  of  mind,  it  may  be  asked,  could  he  at  the 
same  time  have  been  intelligently  resting  his  hopes  for 
eternity  upon  God's  free  sovereign  mercy  to  the  sinner  for 
the  sake  of  Christ  ?  We  believe  that  at  times  there  was 
a  great  occultation  in  Foster's  mind,  and  a  sad  veiling  from 
it  of  the  true  nature  and  glory  of  the  atonement ;  and  that 
under  the  influence  of  such  trains  of  reasoning  and  such 
grappling  with  difficulties  insurmountable  by  the  human 
reason,  he  did  not  accept  fully,  heartily,  the  Bible ^view  of 
man  as  a  sinner  wholly  and  solely  to  blame,  and  saw  not 
clearly,  fully,  in  joyful  experience,  the  Bible  view  of  salva- 
tion to  the  penitent,  as  wholly,  solely  of  grace.  He  passed 
into  a  better  state  of  mind,  but  his  abiding  horror  of  eternal 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  299 

misery,  unaccompanied  by  an  anchor  of  the  soul,  in  the 
depths  of  God's  word  on  that  subject,  tossed  him  perpet- 
ually on  a  sea  of  doubt.  In  the  same  degree  it  palsied  his 
plans  and  efforts  after  usefulness,  and  diffused  over  his  soul, 
in  reference  to  the  missionary  enterprise,  a  chilling  atmos- 
phere, in  which  the  zeal  of  an  Apostle  himself  would  have 
frozen.  Combined  with  the  latent  influences  of  his  preju- 
dices in  favor  of  the  scheme  of  necessity,  it  sometimes 
brought  him  to  the  verge  of  a  startling  irreverence  in  his 
conclusions.  He  dismisses  the  whole  subject  of  the  mis- 
sionary enterprise,  on  one  occasion,  with  the  summary 
sentence,  that  if  the  sovereign  Arbiter  had  intended  the 
salvation  of  the  race,  it  must  have  been  accomplished ! 
The  intimation  in  his  train  of  argument  is,  that  he  did  not 
intend  it,  but  so  far  as  he  did,  it  will  certainly  be  accom- 
plished, and  therefore  there  is  no  great  need  of  impotent 
creatures  like  ourselves,  amidst  such  a  sea  of  troubles  of 
our  own,  taking  much  care  about  it. 

Just  so,  in  the  same  letter  to  Dr.  Harris,  Foster  dis- 
missed the  common  representations  of  the  Deity  as  being 
deeply  moved  with  compassion  for  the  heathen,  and  ear- 
nestly intent  on  human  salvation,  with  the  exclamation,  or 
perhaps  we  should  say  the  daring  sneer,  ''  And  this  is  the 
Almighty  Being,  whose  single  volition  could  transform  the 
whole  race  in  a  moment  I"  The  tone  of  this  letter,  what- 
ever excellencies  there  be  in  it,  is  like  that  of  Cain,  "  Am 
I  my  brother's  keeper  ?"  And  Cain  himself  might  as  well 
have  answered  the  Deity,  "  Thou  mightest  by  a  single 
volition  have  removed  my  brother  Abel  from  my  sight  and 
taken  away  my  temptation.  Thou  didst  never  intend 
that  I  should  not  kill  him."  Or  Adam  himself  might  have 
answered  for  his  sin,  "  Thou  mightest  have  veiled  the  for- 
bidden tree  from  my  vision.  Thou  didst  never  intend  that 
I  should  not  eat  of  the  fruit  of  it."  We  acquit  Foster  of 
all  impiety  in  such  reasoning,  though  the  tone  of  it  savors 
in  one  part  more  of  the  spirit  of  Cain,  and  in  another  of 


300  LIFE    AND    AVRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

that  of  Jonah,  ''  I  do  well  to  be  angry,"  than  of  the  spirit 
of  Paul  or  of  John.  Nor  can  any  one  fail  to  remark  the 
different  manner  of  reasoning  in  regard  to  the  depravity  of 
the  heathen,  employed  by  Foster,  and  that  employed  in  the 
first  chapter  of  the  Epistle  to  the  Romans.  The  inspired 
writer  condemns  man  wholly  as  without  excuse,  and  justi- 
fies the  ways  of  God  to  man  ;  the  uninspired  writer  excuses 
the  depravity  of  man  as  a  thing  forced  upon  him,  an  ele- 
ment of  dire  necessity,  and  condemns  God  as  annexing  an 
eternal  retributive  penalty  for  such  depravity  ! 

We  acquit  Foster  of  all  impiety  of  spirit,  but  he  cer- 
tainly indulged  almost  to  the  last  degree  of  permissible 
freedom,  and  to  the  verge  of  presumption  and  irreverence, 
in  his  speculations  on  this  subject.  His  own  mind  was  so 
tortured  with  it,  with  the  scene  of  human  existence,  as  "  a 
most  mysteriously  awful  economy,  overspread  by  a  lurid 
and  dreadful  shade,"  that  he  had  to  "  pray  for  the  piety  to 
maintain  an  humble  submission  of  thought  and  feeling  to 
the  wise  and  righteous  disposer  of  all  existence."  But  he 
carried  out  the  prejudices  of  his  own  mind  with  a  degree 
of  independence  amounting  to  obstinacy,  and  not  at  all 
characterized  by  that  profound  submissiveness  to  the  Divine 
Wisdom,  which  on  this,  as  on  every  other  subject,  we 
should  have  supposed  so  superior  an  intelligence  as  Foster's 
would  have  exercised.  And  late  in  life  we  can  see  coming 
out  in  his  opinions  the  ineffaceable  mark  which  that  book 
on  the  system  of  necessity  had  left  upon  his  mind. 

Besides  this  work,  Foster  speaks  of  an  old  and  nearly 
unknown  book,  which  he  must  have  seen  at  an  early  period, 
in  favor  of  universal  restitution.  A  book  which  made  an 
impression  on  a  mind  like  Foster's,  was  likely  to  make  it 
deep ;  and  if  he  met  these  two  books  together,  the  currents 
of  thought  would  run  into  one  another  with  great  power. 
The  scheme  of  necessity  at  one  end  comes  fitly  out  in  res- 
titution at  the  other.  If  Foster  had  been  at  this  time  deep 
in  the  Scriptures,  neither  of  these  works  could  have  much 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  301 

affected  him ;  and  there  may  have  been  some  radical  dis- 
tortion in  his  view  of  some  doctrines,  which  he  accepted 
without  hesitation,  that  made  him  shrink  back  from  others 
in  the  plain  truth.  Truth  in  the  Scriptures  leads  on  to 
truth  ;  but  if  a  man's  view  of  the  first  step  be  distorted, 
he  may  easily  be  turned  aside  from  the  second.  If  Mr. 
Foster  believed  that  every  individual  soul  was  created  evil 
by  the  Supreme  Deity,  there  is  little  cause  to  wonder  at 
the  dreadful  struggle  in  his  mind  in  regard  to  what  he  con- 
ceived to  be  eternal  punishment  for  the  inevitable  result  of 
such  creation.  If  he  did  not  believe  the  depravity  of  man 
to  be  voluntary,  but  threw  that  depravity  upon  God  as  his 
creation,  then,  indeed,  he  could  not  receive  the  doctrine 
of  an  endless  retribution,  and  still  hold  to  the  goodness  of 
God.  And  we  are  inclined  to  think  that  this  was  in  some 
measure  the  awful  dilemma  of  his  mind ;  for  he  dismisses 
the  whole  subject  in  his  letter  with  the  reckless  argument 
that  if  the  very  nature  of  man  as  created,  every  individual, 
by  the  Sovereign  Power,  be  in  such  desperate  disorder,  then 
we  cannot  conceive  that  the  race  thus  impotent  will  be 
eternally  punished  for  that  impotence. 

Now,  it  is  a  most  remarkable  fact  that  Mr.  Foster  him- 
self, in  his  Introduction  to  Doddridge's  Rise  and  Progress, 
has  taken  up  and  rebuked  just  this  angry  argument,  as 
supposed  to  be  used  by  a  desperately  careless  man,  as  an 
excuse  or  almost  a  justification  for  his  stupid  and  defying 
indifference  to  consequences,  from  the  moral  impotence  of 
our  nature.  But  he  does  not  there  use  the  astounding  ar- 
gument, with  which,  as  a  desperate  slug,  he  has  loaded  his 
letter.  He  replies  in  a  very  different  way.  "  The  reason- 
ing faculty  of  such  a  man  is  a  wretched  slave,  that  will 
not,  and  dare  not,  listen  to  one  word  in  presence  and  in 
contravention  of  his  passions  and  will.  The  only  thing 
there  would  be  any  sense  in  attempting  would  be,  to  press 
on  him  some  strong  images  of  the  horror  of  such  a  delib- 
erate self-consignment  to  destruction,  and  of  the  monstrous 


302  LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

enormity  of  taking  a  kind  of  comfort  in  his  approach  to  the 
pit,  from  the  circumstance  that  a  principle  in  his  nature 
leads  him  to  it;  just  as  if,  because  there  is  that  in  him 
which  impels  him  to  perdition^  it  would  therefore  not  be 
he  that  will  perish.  Till  some  awful  blast  smite  on  his 
fears,  his  reason  and  conscience  will  be  unavailing." 

Is  it  not  remarkable  to  the  last  degree,  that  Mr.  Foster 
should  have  rebuked  as  "  monstrous,"  a  mode  of  reasoning 
in  behalf  of  the  individual,  which  he  himself  uses  in  behalf 
of  the  race  ?  Because  there  is  that  in  the  race,  which  impels 
it  to  perdition,  Mr.  Foster  argues  that  therefore  the  race 
will  not  perish.  But  when  the  same  '•  moral  impotence  of 
our  nature"  is  urged  by  the  hardened  man,  as  if,  on  account 
of  it,  it  will  not  be  he  that  will  perish,  the  reasoning  faculty 
of  such  a  man  is  justly  asserted  to  be  a  wretched  slave. 
That,  however,  which  ought  to  have  been  rebuked  as  itself 
a  "  monstrous  enormity"  and  a  hideous  distortion  of  the- 
ology, is  the  supposition  that  a  created  moral  impotence 
can  be  the  subject  of  punishment  at  all ;  or  rather,  in  the 
first  place,  the  outrageous  supposition  that  there  is  such  a 
thing  as  a  created  moral  impotence^  and  in  the  second  place, 
if  there  is,  that  such  a  creation  can  be  punished.  It  might 
be  called  an  argument  black  with  the  smoke  of  the  pit,  for 
it  must  be  mahgnant  spirits  that  delight  so  to  obscure  the 
ways  of  God  to  man.  But  the  smoke  which  issues  in  such 
a  jet  from  the  close  of  Mr.  Foster's  letter  is  not  so  much,  as 
by  him  assumed,  against  the  doctrine  of  eternal  punishment, 
as  against  any  punishment  at  all. 

But  where  did  Mr.  Foster  learn  this  truly  despairing 
theology,  which  prepared  him  so  fatally  to  listen  to  the  ar- 
guments of  Necessity  and  Universal  Restitution  ?  He 
could  not  so  have  read  the  Scriptures.  It  must  have  been 
the  malignant  intrusion  of  a  darkening  philosophy,  which 
was  set,  as  an  heir-loom  of  his  education,  in  the  recesses 
of  his  mind,  and  wove  a  tissue  of  palsying  lurid  doubt 
through  one  whole  region  of  his  speculations.     It  was  this, 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  303 

and  not  the  eternity  of  punishment,  that  was  to  him  as  a 
shirt  of  fire  thrown  over  the  body  of  his  theology. 

Where  did  these  principles  come  from,  and  whence  their 
singular  outbreak  at  so  late  a  period  in  life,  as  if  some  de- 
moniac art  had  "  buried  the  seed  and  kept  it  artificially 
torpid,  that  it  might  be  quickened  into  germination"  at  a 
time  when  there  would  be  less  questioning  of  its  nature, 
less  suspicion  of  its  truth  !  If  it  came  as  an  element  of 
Foster's  instruction  in  his  early  days,  it  reminds  us  of  his 
own  warning  ''  that  whatever  entwines  itself  with  the  youth- 
ful feelings,  maintains  a  strange  tenacity,  and  seems  to  in- 
sinuate into  the  vitality  of  the  being.  How  important  to 
watch  lest  what  is  thus  combining  with  its  life,  should  con- 
tain a  principle  of  moral  death  I"  And  it  may  be  consid- 
ered the  master  policy  of  the  Spirit  of  Evil  to  put  principles 
into  the  mind  beforehand,  under  the  guise  of  truth,  which 
it  is  foreseen  will  act  as  powerfully  against  the  truth,  as 
if  there  were  "  a  shield  invisibly  held  by  a  demon's  hand," 
or  if  not  act  against  it,  will  veil  and  darken  it,  will  fetter 
and  perplex  it,  and  make  it  enclose  the  soul  like  a  net,  in- 
stead of  surrounding  it  like  a  luminous  atmosphere. 

It  was  jast  thus  that  even  a  mind  of  such  power,  and  a 
soul  of  such  undoubted  piety,  as  Mr.  Foster's  became  en- 
tangled in  the  truth,  instead  of  walking  at  liberty  and 
illuminated  by  it.  Accursed  by  the  intrusion  of  the  mud 
and  poison  of  such  philosophy  into  the  clear  running  stream 
of  the  Word  of  God  !  Could  it  be  seen  as  mud,  it  would 
be  rejected  as  mud ;  but  men  drink  of  it  as  the  water  of 
life.  How  dark  a  stuff  is  mere  human  speculation  !  What 
a  series  of  caves  are  the  recesses  of  the  mind  consigned  to 
it ;  recesses  of  such  depth,  that  if  you  take  a  light  to  ex- 
amine them,  you  find  the  air  itself  is  mephitic,  and  you  are 
in  danger  of  having  your  eyes  put  out  by  the  bats  that  fly 
from  them. 

But  Mr.  Foster's  argument,  concerning  "  the  moral  im- 
potence of  the  race,"  does  not  altogether  wear  the  air  of  a 


304  LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

sincere  conviction  even  in  his  own  mind.  It  seems  to  have 
been  a  sort  of  angry  exaggeration  and  distortion  of  the 
scriptural  view  of  human  depravity,  which  he  threw  out  in 
the  impatience  of  a  tempted  spirit,  to  justify  his  efforts 
against  the  awful  reality  pressing  on  his  soul.  He  shields 
himself  behind  an  angry  and  irreverent  if;  for  he  did  not 
dare  to  put  the  supposition  in  the  shape  of  an  assertion. 
Grant  the  if  indeed,  and  the  conclusion  follows.  If  God 
himself  created  "a  desperate  disorder,"  it  follows  that  he 
created  the  inevitable  results  of  that  disorder ;  and  if  so, 
then  both  the  disorder  and  its  results  are  good  ;  for  an  ab- 
solutely and  infinitely  good  being  can  create  nothing  evil. 
Nor  is  it  conceivable  that  punishment  of  any  kind  should 
be  annexed  to  a  disorder,  of  which  God  himself  is  the  au- 
thor, unless,  indeed,  the  punishment  also  be  considered 
as  a  good,  leading  to  a  higher  good,  which  it  is  not,  if  it  be 
eternal.  It  cannot  be  considered  a  good  for  the  wicked, 
however  it  may  subserve  the  interests  of  the  universe  of 
God. 

But  Foster's  mind  is  occupied  with  the  fate  of  the  wicked 
exclusively,  and  their  salvation  at  all  hazards  is  resolved 
upon.  The  care  of  the  good,  the  effect  of  sin  upon  them, 
released  from  an  eternal  retribution,  the  necessity  of  some 
penal  safeguard  for  the  universe,  the  inevitable  failure  of 
the  Atonement,  without  such  a  safeguard,  the  demand 
through  all  eternity  for  an  adequate  manifestation  of  the 
Divine  justice,  all  these  great  considerations  are  put  out  of 
view ;  they  are  not  permitted  to  occupy  the  attention  ;  or 
if  spoken  of,  they  are  presented  as  "  lightly  assumed  and 
presumptuous  maxims  respecting  penal  example  in  the 
order  of  the  divine  government,"  while  the  doubt  as  to  the 
Divine  goodness  from  "  the  awfulness  of  the  economy" 
of  eternal  retribution  is  morbidly  enlarged  and  dragged  into 
notice. 

Mr.  Foster  seems  to  have  written  some  of  these  letters 
in  a  terrific  mood.     It  is  as  if  we  saw  a  Christian  Dioojenes 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  305 

in  his  tub.  It  is  as  if  Job  were  before  us  on  his  dunghill 
giving  vent  to  the  bitterness  of  a  wounded  spirit.  And  there 
are  some  vast  sneers  at  the  mode  of  preaching  in  the  ex- 
hibition of  the  divine  compassion,  which  are  as  if  Satan  had 
stood  by  the  road-side  when  our  Saviour  wept  over  Jerusa- 
lem, and  had  exclaimed.  And  this  is  the  Being  who  could 
by  a  single  volition  make  the  soul  of  every  person  in  Jeru- 
salem receive  him  with  delight ! 

Aye  !  and  it  loas  Satan  by  the  road-side  in  Foster's  own 
mind.  And  instead  of  a  bold  unhesitating  appeal  in  an- 
swer from  the  Word  of  God,  we  hear  again  the  hiss  of  the 
serpent!  "  Perhaps  there  is  some  pertinence  in  a  sugges- 
tion which  I  recollect  to  have  seen  in  some  old  and  nearly 
unknown  book  in  favor  of  universal  restitution."  The  hiss 
of  the  serpent,  old  indeed  and  pertinent !  Has  God  said, 
ye  shall  not  eat  ?  Yet  God  doth  know  ye  shall  not  surely 
die.  Apollyonin  this  conflict  has  taken  from  Foster's  hand 
the  sword  of  the  Spirit,  which  is  the  Word  of  God,  and  in 
its  place  has  slipped  into  his  grasp  a  figurative  symbol  or 
accommodation  of  that  Word,  and  the  power  of  the  Word 
is  all  gone.  And  instead  of  the  voice,  YratyB  bniGM  fwv, 
^arava,  Get  tliec  behind  me  Sata7i,  or  the  mighty  word, 
yiyQumcti^  it  is  written^  we  hear  the  tongue  of  unbelief — 
strongly  figurative  expressions  I  A  man  like  Bunyan 
would  have  recorded  this  style  of  experience  as  a  beset- 
ment  by  the  fiends  in  the  Valley  of  Tophet,  and  with  the 
greatest  truth  and  accuracy ;  and  what  seems  amazing  is 
the  morbid  craving  after  doubt,  the  voracity  with  which 
suggestions  of  difficulty  and  darkness  are  seized  and  rumi- 
nated upon,  to  the  exclusion  of  what  is  clear  and  incontro- 
vertible, so  that  at  length  light  seems  to  retire,  and  the 
clouds  roll  thick  and  heavy  over  the  firmament. 

Amidst  these  doubts  and  difficulties,  wrestling  with  them 
and  grimly  pressing  on,  beneath  the  "lurid  and  dreadful 
shade  of  a  mysteriously  awful  economy,"  we  behold  this 
great  mind  out  at  sea,  amidst  darkness,  hurricane,  the  wind 


306  LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

howling,  the  waves  roaring.  Sometimes  the  image  is  as 
that  of  a  powerful  steamer,  thrown  on  her  side  by  a  moun- 
tain billow,  her  fires  still  burning,  her  engine  crashing  on, 
her  wheels  on  one  side  buried  and  ploughing  the  deep,  on 
the  other  as  iron  wings  thundering  in  the  air  amidst  the 
tempest.  For  with  Foster's  mind  it  was  a  tempest ;  and 
if  he  speaks  of  it,  but  briefly  and  calmly,  it  was  because 
all  his  emotions,  as  stirred  by  mental  conflicts,  were  com- 
pressed with  a  severity  of  condensation  that  allowed  of  no 
noisy  or  superficial  escape.  The  great  doubt  with  him 
supplied  the  place  of  ten  thousand  minor  ones  ;  for  it  was 
a  doubt  even  as  to  the  benevolence  of  the  Divine  economy ; 
a  temptation  which  in  such  a  mind  wrought  with  a  force 
terrible  and  inevitable.  The  wind  that  raised  the  waves, 
compressed  them  and  kept  them  from  breaking,  or  the  ocean 
had  been  sheeted  with  foam.  Ho  had  piety  to  pray  for 
submission,  and  God's  arm  held  him,  and  amidst  all  con- 
flicts he  never  failed  to  exercise  a  prayerful,  watchful  faith 
in  God's  merciful  superintending  providence  over  his  own 
life  and  destiny. 

There  is  a  striking  resemblance  between  his  experience, 
and  that  of  the  author  of  the  73rd  Psalm,  tliough  absolutely 
the  reverse  in  almost  every  point,  and  a  resemblance  of 
powerful  contrast.  The  scepticism  in  the  Psalmist's  mind 
was  in  regard  to  the  allowed  prosperity  of  the  wicked,  and 
the  seeming  want  and  denial  in  the  divine  economy,  of  any 
adequate  retribution.  It  took  such  a  deep  hold  of  the  soul, 
and  spread  such  a  "  lurid  and  mysterious  shade"  over  God's 
dispensations  that  the  mind  was  almost  driven  from  its 
balance ;  the  feet  of  the  saint  had  well  nigh  gone,  his  steps 
had  almost  slipped,  and  he  was  on  the  point  of  renouncing 
his  faith  in  the  goodness  of  the  Deity.  He  was  losing  his 
hold  on  the  goodness  of  God,  because  it  seemed  to  him 
that  God  had  no  retributive  justice.  He  was  brought 
back,  his  feet  were  placed  upon  the  rock,  he  was  brought 
as  a  madman  or  a  beast  to  his  senses,  by  coming  into  God's 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  307 

sanctuary,  and  there  knowing  what  God  loould  do  in  the 
eternal  world.  Was  there  ever  a  more  instructive  lesson  ? 
Was  there  ever  a  more  instructive  and  solemn  contrast 
and  resemblance  between  this  man's  doubts  and  the  cure  of 
them,  and  Foster's  doubts,  with  his  failure  of  a  cure,  until 
he  went  not  merely  into  the  sanctuary  of  God,  but  into 
eternity  itself!  Foster's  scepticism  was  as  to  the  goodness 
of  God,  because  of  his  justice,  because  of  the  undeniable 
looming  up  in  the  Christian  system  of  the  doctrine  of 
Eternal  Retribution  !  There  was  no  resource  in  the 
sanctuary  for  that ;  there  was  no  help  in  God's  Word  for 
that ;  nor  any  cure,  even  if  one  should  rise  from  the  dead, 
for  the  scepticism  of  a  man  who  would  not  believe  on  the 
power  of  God's  Word  in  that.  If  a  man  persisted  in  that 
doubt,  there  was  no  care  for  such  scepticism,  but  to  go  into 
eternity,  to  enter  what  Foster  called  the  absolute  unknown^ 
but  which,  in  the  light  of  God's  Word,  is  as  absolute  a 
known  as,  to  the  eye  of  faith,  God  could  make  it. 

Pressed,  then,  by  this  doubt  on  the  one  side,  and  the 
awful  language  of  the  Word  of  God  on  the  other,  and  yet 
exclaiming.  It  is  too  horrible  !  I  cannot  believe !  Eternity  ! 
my  soul  shudders  at  the  thought !  God  cannot  be  good, 
and  yet  appoint  an  eternal  retribution  I — exclaiming  thus, 
and  still  holding  to  the  scepticism  arising  from  his  limited 
view  of  the  Divine  government  and  attributes,  and  his  intense 
fixedness  of  contemplation  on  one  point,  eternity,  we  do 
not  wonder  that  such  a  mind  even  as  Foster's  had  well 
nigh  slipped,  nor  that  he,  like  the  Psalmist,  was  as  a  beast 
before  God.  But  let  the  contrast  be  profoundly  marked. 
The  Psalmist  doubted  of  God's  goodness  for  leant  of  retru 
button.  John  Foster  doubted  of  God's  goodness  because 
of  retribution.  The  Psalmist  was  convinced  and  made 
submissive  and  trustful  by  what  he  was  assured  would  be 
in  eternity ;  but  Foster  was  racked  with  distrust  and 
doubt  by  what  he  feared  would  be  in  eternity.  The 
Psalmist  was  convinced  by  God's  Word,  and  rested  on  it; 


308  LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

but  Foster's  mind  was  thrown  into  anguish  by  the  plain 
interpretation  of  that  Word,  and  sought  to  evade  it.  Foster 
would  not  bow  unhesitatingly  before  the  Majesty  of  God's 
Word;  he  wanted  a  firm  unquestioning  trust  in  it;  he 
wanted  faith.  His  grand  defect  was  a  gloomy  self-reliance 
on  his  own  reasoning  powers,  in  lieu  of  an  humble  inquiry, 
What  saith  the  Lord  ?  He  stood  like  Thomas  in  the  presence 
of  his  Lord,  demanding  the  wounds  in  his  side  and  the 
prints  of  the  nails. 

Nor  can  anything  be  more  unphilosophical  and  erroneous 
in  principle,  or  dangerous  in  example,  than  Mr.  Foster's 
mode  of  reasoning  on  this  subject.  He  demanded,  on  a 
subject  of  faith  alone,  an  evidence  destructive  of  the  nature 
of  faith.  He  demanded  that  God  should  force  conviction 
on  every  mind.  He  demanded  that  the  doctrine  of  eternal 
retribution  should  be  so  presented,  "as  to  leave  no  possi- 
bility of  understanding  the  language  in  a  different,  equivo- 
cal, or  questionable  sense;"  that  it  should  be  so  "presented, 
as  to  render  "  all  doubt  or  question  a  mere  palpable  ab- 
surdity P  Now,  it  is  plain  that  this,  in  regard  to  anything 
that  demands  beliefs  and  is  not  matter  of  experience,  per- 
sonal experience,  is  impossible.  The  very  fact  that  God  is 
cannot  be  so  stated,  as  to  leave  no  possibility  of  under- 
standing it  in  a  questionable  sense.  The  doctrine  of  eter- 
nal retribution,  as  demanding  belief,  cannot  be  so  stated  as 
to  preclude  belief,  and  form  experience.  This  world  must 
be  changed  from  a  world  of  preparation  for  the  eternal 
world  into  an  experience  of  the  realities  of  that  world, 
before  this  can  be  the  case ;  in  other  words,  God's  present 
system  of  probation  under  the  power  of  the  atonement,  by 
which  the  penalty  of  his  law  is  kept  from  execution,  and 
men  are  warned  of  it,  and  commanded  and  urged  to  pre- 
pare against  it,  and  to  prepare  for  blessedness  instead  of 
misery  in  the  future  world,  must  be  broken  up  ;  and  instead 
of  warnings  of  what  is  to  come,  and  descriptions  demand- 
ing belief,  and  the  revelations  of  principles  requiring  faith, 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  309 

the  fires  of  the  eternal  world  must  be  kindled  in  this  ;  and 
instead  of  a  picture  so  graphic,  and  a  description  so  awful, 
of  the  sinner  in  the  place  of  torment,  that  anything  beyond 
it  would  transcend  the  province  of  faith,  and  set  aside  all 
the  laws  of  the  human  mind  in  regard  to  evidence,  there 
must  not  only  be  exhibited  here  a  sinner  in  torment,  but 
every  individual  accountable  agent  must  be  put  into  the 
same  torment,  and  then  told  this  is  what  punishment  means, 
and  this  is  to  be  eternal !  But  even  then,  this  latter  truth 
as  to  the  eternity  of  retribution  could  not,  without  the 
experience  also  of  that,  be  so  framed  as  to  preclude  all  pos- 
sibility  of  question.  For  when  the  declaration  had  been 
made,  and  in  the  most  explicit  terms  that  human  language 
can  command,  the  mind  of  the  sceptic  might  say,  This  can- 
not be  !  there  must  be  some  other  way  of  understanding 
this  !  It  is  absolutely  inconsistent  with  God's  goodness,  and 
must  have  a  different  interpretation.  And  if  God  should 
speak  the  truth  audibly  to  every  individual,  every  day  of 
his  existence,  instead  of  leaving  it  simply  written  in  his 
Word,  the  case  would  be  the  same.  And  if  he  should 
write  it  in  characters  of  fire  in  the  firmament,  or  make 
such  a  disposition  of  the  planets  in  heaven,  as  that  they 
should  read  it  nightly  to  the  soul,  the  case  would  be  the 
same.  There  would  be  no  possibility  oi  forcing  conviction 
without  experience,  no  possibility  of  doing  this,  and  still 
leaving  to  the  soul  the  alternative  of  believing  or  dis- 
believing. 

A  conviction  absolutely  irresistible,  can  only  be  that  of 
experience.  But  this  would  destroy  the  element  of  free- 
agency,  and  the  possibility  of  the  voluntary  formation  of 
character,  the  choice  of  principles  of  action.  It  would  de- 
stroy the  system  of  preparation  for  the  Eternal  World,  under 
which  we  evidently  are  placed,  and  would  make  this  world, 
instead  of  that,  the  world  of  retribution.  On  the  theory 
that  eternal  retribution  is  true,  it  is  impossible  to  make  it 
a  matter  of  experience  in  a  world  for  the  trial  of  character, 


310  LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

but  it  must  be  left  as  a  matter  of  faith,  as  in  the  Scriptures. 
On  the  theory  that  it  is  not  true,  the  Scriptures,  which  are 
the  only  authentic  source  of  the  idea  of  eternal  retribution, 
and  of  all  our  information  in  regard  to  it,  are,  on  that  sub- 
ject, glaring  with  falsehood.  On  the  theory  that  it  is  true, 
there  is  no  conceivable  mode  of  presenting  it  to  the  mind  as 
an  article  of  belief  which  the  Scriptures  have  not  taken  ; 
and  their  main  power  over  the  soul  consists,  in  the  acknowl- 
edgment even  of  those  who  deny  the  doctrine,  in  the  awful 
terror  in  which  the  retributions  of  eternity  are  actually  there 
shrouded.  The  dread  power  of  the  doctrine  over  Foster's 
own  mind,  proves  the  tremendous  distinctness  with  which 
it  has  been  somewhere  revealed ;  but  an  original  distinct 
source  of  it  anywhere  but  in  the  Word  of  God  it  is  impos- 
sible to  find,  except  we  take  the  universal  intimations  of 
conscience  in  answer  to  that  Word,  and  the  intimations  of 
retribution  in  the  souls  of  the  heathen,  as  such  a  source. 

Now  it  is  a  remarkable  fact,  that  in  regard  to  another 
fundamental  truth  of  the  Christian  revelation,  which  Foster 
with  his  whole  heart  accepted,  but  which  others  have  denied 
(as  indeed,  where  is  the  truth  revealed  in  the  Scriptures 
which  men  may  not  deny,  if  they  will,  not  being  forced  into 
conviction  ?)  he  adopted  a  mode  of  reasoning  diametrically 
opposite  to  that  which  he  attempted  in  regard  to  eternal 
retribution,  and  destructive  of  it.  In  one  of  his  admirable 
letters  to  Miss  Saunders,  after  a  simple  repetition  of  many 
of  the  passages  in  the  Word  of  God  in  regard  to  the  atone- 
ment, he  meets  the  objector  thus  :  "  There  are  persons  who 
revolt  at  such  a  view  of  the  foundation  of  all  our  hopes,  and 
would  say.  Why  might  not  the  Almighty,  of  his  mere  im- 
mediate benevolence^  pardon  the  offences  of  his  frail  crea- 
tures when  they  repent,  without  any  sach  intermediation 
and  vicarious  suffering  ?  It  is  enough  to  answer,  that 
Supreme  Wisdom  was  the  sole  competent  judge  in  the 
universe,  of  what  was  the  plan  most  worthy  of  holiness  and 
goodness  ;  and  that,  unless  the  New  Testament  be  the  most 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  311 

deceptive  book  that  eve)'  ivas  written^  the  plan  actually  ap- 
pointed is  that  of  a  suffering  Mediator." 

Now,  a  candid  mind  cannot  read  the  New  Testament 
free  of  all  attempt  to  evade  its  plain  meaning,  without  find- 
ing the  truth  of  an  eternal  retribution  as  fully  and  ex- 
plicitly revealed  as  that  of  a  vicarious  Redeemer.  And 
to  Foster's  own  objections  on  the  score  of  his  limited  views 
of  the  Divine  Benevolence,  it  is  enough  to  answer,  that  Su- 
preme Wisdom  was  the  sole  competent  judge  in  the  universe 
of  what  was  the  plan  most  worthy  of  holiness  and  goodness  ; 
and  that  unless  the  New  Testament  be  the  most  deceptive 
book  that  ever  was  written,  the  plan  actually  appointed 
embraces  an  eternal  retribution. 

Furthermore,  if  the  condition  of  faith  in  a  suffering 
Mediator  be  the  only  condition  of  eternal  salvation,  a  truth 
fully  received  by  Foster,  then,  on  the  ground  of  his  own 
reasoning  in  regard  to  eternal  retribution,  that  truth  ought 
to  have  been  so  presented  "  as  to  leave  no  possibility  of  un- 
derstanding the  language  in  a  different  equivocal  or  ques- 
tionable sense ;"  it  ought  to  have  been  so  presented,  as  to 
render  all  "  doubt  or  question  a  mere  palpable  absurdity." 
For  if  the  danger  of  eternal  retribution  be  so  awful,  as  that 
God  ought  thus  to  force  conviction  on  the  soul,  the  only 
condition  of  eternal  salvation  is  so  infinitely  important  that 
he  ought  in  like  manner  to  force  conviction  of  that  also. 
And  if  any  alleged  possibility  of  doubt  in  regard  to  the 
meaning  of  the  language  is  to  be  held  a  sufficient  ground 
for  denying  the  first,  the  same  possibility  is  an  equally  suffi- 
cient ground  for  denying  the  last,  and  Foster's  mode  of  rea- 
soning would  cut  the  soul  equally  from  the  belief  in  a  suf- 
fering mediator  and  an  eternal  retribution.  But  Mr.  Foster 
never  seems  to  have  had  the  shadow  of  a  thought  that  the 
condition  of  eternal  salvation,  as  the  only  condition,  was 
not  revealed  with  sufficient  distinctness,  or  that,  li  it  be  the 
only  condition,  it  ought  to  be  revealed  with  a  power  abso- 
lutely overwhelming,  and  forestalling  dXX  possibility  of  doubt. 


m^ 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 


Why,  then,  attempt  any  such  reasonhig  in  regard  to  the 
truth  of  eternal  retribution  ?  In  neither  case  was  it  pos- 
sible to  force  conviction  by  experience  ;  in  both  cases  the 
evidence  comes  as  near  to  absolute  physical  demonstration, 
as  could  have  been,  without  violating  the  laws  of  the  human 
raind  in  regard  to  belief.  In  both  cases  the  evidence  is 
positive,  clear,  incontrovertible ;  not  to  be  set  aside  in  any 
way  without  evasion  ;  and  in  every  way  so  palpable,  that 
if  it  be  denied,  the  New  Testament  instantly  becomes  the 
most  deceptive  book  that  ever  was  written. 

Precisely  the  same  reasoning  annihilates  the  force  of  Mr. 
Foster's  remarks  as  to  the  unreasonable  shortness  of  the 
time  of  our  probation,  if  an  eternal  retribution  be  the  evil 
from  which  we  are  to  escape.  So,  likewise,  if  the  condi- 
tion of  eternal  salvation  be  the  only  condition  on  which 
man  can  be  saved,  a  truth  which  Foster  constantly,  and 
with  all  the  power  of  his  intellect,  asserts,  the  shortness  of 
the  time  of  our  probation  is  equally  unreasonable  for  meet- 
ing that  condition.  The  objection  which  would  release  the 
mind  from  its  obligation  to  believe  the  one  truth,  is  equally 
valid  against  the  other ;  though  of  utter  futility  and  false- 
hood in  both  cases.  And  the  same  may  be  said  of  what 
Foster  has  advanced  in  regard  to  the  preaching  of  the 
truth  of  eternal  retribution  ;  namely,  that  if  true,  it  ought 
to  be  screamed  into  the  ears  of  every  creature ;  it  ought  to 
be  proclaimed,  as  with  the  blast  of  a  trumpet,  "  inculcated 
and  reiterated,  with  ardent  passion,  in  every  possible  form 
of  terrible  illustration,  no  remission  of  the  alarm  ;  for  the 
most  prolonged  thundering  alarm  is  but  as  the  note  of  an 
infant,  a  bird,  or  an  insect,  in  proportion  to  the  horrible 
urgency  of  the  case."  Assuredly  the  same  may  be  said  of 
the  ONLY  condition  of  eternal  salvation,  that  if  true,  it 
ought  to  be  proclaimed  in  like  manner,  as  with  the  blast  of 
a  trumpet,  no  remission  of  the  alarm. 

And  accordingly,  it  is  so  proclaimed ;  both  these  mighty 
doctrines  being  true,  they  are,  with  equal  passion,  incul- 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  313 

cated  and  reiterated,  in  every  possible  form  of  terrible  il- 
lustration. The  sacred  writers  do  but  turn  from  the  one 
to  enforce  the  other,  and  use  the  one  to  burn  in  the  other ; 
so  that  the  whole  naaterial  of  revelation,  well-nigh,  is  the 
mutual  support,  reverberation,  and  '^  thundering,"  as  well 
as  persuasive  proclamation  of  these  truths.  "  Knowing 
the  terror  of  the  Lord,  we  persuade  men."  By  his  terrors 
we  persuade  them  to  embrace  his  love,  and  by  his  love  we 
persuade  them  to  shun  his  terrors.  And  this  doctrine  of  a 
suffering  Mediator,  which  Foster  avows,  is  proclaimed  with 
no  less  thundering  alarm,  than  that  doctrine  of  eternal 
retribution  which  he  hastily  and  presumptuously  rejects. 
"  He  that  belie veth  on  the  Son  hath  everlasting  life  ;  and 
he  that  believeth  not  on  the  Son,  shall  not  see  life ;  but  the 
wrath  of  God  abideth  on  him." 

It  would  have  gone  beyond  even  Mr.  Foster's  power  in 
the  use  of  human  language,  to  have  invented  stronger 
terms  than  these,  or  to  have  proclaimed  a  suffering  Media- 
tor and  eternal  retribution  in  notes  of  more  thundering 
alarm.  For  the  passage  is,  in  spiritual  meaning,  power 
and  distinctness,  like  the  crash  of  an  earthquake,  like  the 
thunder  of  the  Almighty  from  one  end  of  heaven  to  the 
other.  And  not  to  name  the  scores  of  similar  notes  of 
alarm  "  proportioned  to  the  horrible  urgency  of  the  case," 
the  passages  in  the  sixth  Hebrews,  4-6,  and  tenth  Hebrews^ 
26—31,  are  sufficient  examples  of  the  united  and  equally 
awful  sanctions  of  terror  in  preaching  both  a  suffering 
Mediator  and  eternal  retribution.  These  two  elements  in- 
deed are  so  combined  in  the  Word  of  God,  so  indissolubly 
twisted  together,  so  wrought  into  each  other's  fabric  for 
mutual  support,  power,  and  illustration,  that  the  one  with- 
out the  other  is  ineffectual,  and  can  scarcely,  by  a  logical 
mind,  be  received. 

And,  in  fact,  in  the  very  next  breath  after  the  utterance 
of  Foster's  demand  for  thundering  alarm  on  the  gi-ound  of 
eternal  retribution,  he  does  himself  declare  that  the  larger 

14 


314  LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

proportion  of  what  is  said  of  sinners  and  addressed  to  them 
in  the  Bible,  is  plainly  in  a  tone  of  menace  and  of  terror. 
And  he  repeats  the  deliberate  affirmation  of  Dr.  Watts, 
that  of  all  the  persons  to  whom  his  ministry  had  been  effi- 
cacious, only  onp.  had  received  the  first  effectual  impressions 
from  the  gentle  and  attractive  aspects  of  religion ;  all  the 
rest  from  the  awful  and  alarming  ones,  the  appeals  to  fear. 
And  this,  adds  Foster,  is  all  but  universally  the  manner 
of  the  Divine  process  of  conversion. 

Now  what  an  inconsequence  is  here !  most  strange  in- 
deed for  a  reasoner  like  Foster.  We  have  him  in  one 
breath  demanding,  as  the  result,  enforcement,  and  proof 
of  a  certain  doctrine  which  he  doubts,  that  it  be  proclaimed, 
reiterated  and  thundered  without  cessation ;  and  in  the 
next,  declaring  that  such  is  the  tenor  of  the  Scriptures ; 
and  yet  denying  the  doctrine,  and  in  effect  charging  the 
Scriptures  with  proclaiming,  reiterating  and  thundering  an 
alarm,  behind  which  there  is  no  reality,  and  for  which  there 
is  no  foundation  ! 

But  worse  than  this,  he  proceeds  to  say  that  a  number 
of  ministers  of  his  acquaintance  have  disbelieved  the  doc- 
trine, but  yet  have  thought  they  should  better  consult  their 
usefulness  by  appearing  to  teach  it ;  they  were  unwilling 
to  incur  the  imputation  of  a  want  of  orthodoxy,  and  they 
found  the  doctrine  itself,  even  in  its  most  terrible  form,  so 
strangely  inefficacious  to  deter  men  from  sin,  that  they 
*'  did  not  feel  required  to  propound  any  qualification  of  it, 
since  thoughtless  and  wicked  men  would  be  sure  to  seize 
on  the  mitigated  doctrine  to  encourage  themselves  in  their 
impenitence."  This  is  but  to  say  that,  seeing  that  the 
truth  failed  to  bring  men  to  God,  they  thought  they  should 
be  more  useful  by  the  inculcation  of  a  lie.  The  lie  being 
supposed  by  most  men  to  be  imbedded  in  God's  Word  as 
the  truth,  and  being  found  the  only  effiaoious  means  of  re- 
claiming men  from  sin,  these  ministers  have  deemed  it 
most  useful  to  make  use  of  the  lie  I     If  this  course   be 


J 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  315 

charged  upon  the  Scriptures,  it  is  one  of  the  worst  forms 
of  blasphemy  and  infidelity.  And  how  can  this  conse- 
quence be  avoided  ?  On  the  supposition  that  the  doctrine 
of  eternal  punishment  is  so  taught  in  the  Scriptures,  as 
that  nine-tenths  of  mankind  find  it  there,  and  the  most 
spiritual  and  heaven-instructed  preachers  proclaim  it,  and 
that  it  is,  as  thus  understood,  the  sole  element  of  irresistible 
efficacy  in  the  Scriptures,  on  what  ground  can  the  conclu- 
sion be  avoided  that  the  Scriptures  are  a  book  of  "  infinite 
deception"  ?  The  difference  between  an  eternal  and  a 
temporary  retribution  is  infinite  ;  the  propounding  of  an 
eternal  retribution,  if  it  be  not  true,  is  an  infinite  lie. 
And  they  who  lend  themselves  to  this  are  acting  on  the 
principle,  on  which  the  great  Apostasy  has  been  buildedj 
and  to  which  is  annexed  the  seal  of  the  Divine  reprobation, 
"  Let  us  do  evil  that  good  may  come." 

Of  the  disingenuousness  of  such  a  course  as  Mr.  Foster 
describes  in  the  ministers  of  his  acquaintance,  their  preach- 
ing or  apparent  preaching  of  this  doctrine  in  public,  their 
disbelief  of  it  in  private,  and  their  whisperings  and  circula- 
tions of  such  disbelief  in  familiar  circles,  we  need  say  noth- 
ing. We  wonder  that  a  mind  of  such  independence,  noble- 
ness, integrity,  sincerity,  and  fearlessness  as  Mr.  Foster's, 
could  have  been  warped  at  all  into  any  excuse  of  such  a 
course,  much  less  any  sanction  of  it  by  example.  The 
habit  of  such  casuistry  must  be  powerful  beneath  the 
teachings  of  an  Established  Church,  which  propounds 
Thirty-Nine  Articles  of  belief  to  be  sworn  upon  as  the  con- 
ditions of  earthly  emolument  and  usefulness,  with  the  un- 
derstood provision  that  the  oath  of  belief  may  or  may  not 
mean  belief  according  to  the  opinion  of  the  swearer.  But 
out  of  the  Establishment  could  it  have  been  supposed  that 
such  casuistry  would  prevail  ?  Let  a  man  believe  or 
disbelieve  at  his  pleasure,  and  if  he  chooses,  teach  it  wholly, 
or  keep  it  to  himself.  "While  it  remained,  was  it  not 
thine  own  ?     And  when  it  was  sold,  was  it  not  in  thine 


316  LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

own  power  ?"  But  to  appear  to  preach  it  in  public,  and 
in  private  to  circulate  the  mischief  of  unbelief;  in  public 
to  proclaim  the  terrors  of  the  Lord,  in  private  to  reduce 
them  to  a  vast  and  glaring  deception ;  in  public  to  main- 
tain the  sanctions  of  the  law,  in  private  to  disarm  them  by- 
reasonings  against  the  penalty ; — this  is  a  course  which 
nothing  can  justify,  and  which  tends  to  unsettle  the  foun- 
dations of  theology  and  morality  together. 

In  reference  to  Foster  himself,  the  truth  seems  to  be 
that  his  own  mind  was  never  really  settled  on  this  subject, 
but  was  swayed  to  and  fro,  and  sometimes,  perhaps,  in 
dreadful  agitation.  In  no  other  way  can  we  account  for 
the  inconsistencies  of  his  reasonings,  and  the  contradiction 
between  the  menacing  tenor  of  his  writings  in  the  prospect 
of  the  Eternal  World,  and  the  hesitating  plunge  into  a 
complete  denial  of  eternal  retribution  in  his  letter  to  a  stu- 
dent in  theology.  But  then,  what  a  picture  of  vagueness 
and  indetermination  in  theological  opinion  is  presented  in  a 
man,  whose  practical  writings  are  of  so  definite,  compact 
and  powerful  a  tissue,  and  whose  personal  solemn  impres- 
sions of  the  eternal  world  make  many  of  his  pages  look  as 
if  written  in  the  light  of  the  vast  pyre  of  eternal  burnings  ! 
We  cannot  but  contrast  what  we  have  seen  him  saying  in 
1841,  with  his  opinion  and  advice  on  the  same  subject  in 
1801.  In  that  year  he  had  occasion  to  write  to  the  Rev. 
Dr.  Ryland  a  criticism  upon  one  of  the  Doctor's  sermons, 
the  subject  of  which  was  the  eternal  punishment  of  the 
wicked.  It  is  said  to  have  been  a  sermon  in  its  delivery 
eminently  powerful  and  successful,  and  Foster  himself 
acknowledged  in  very  strong  terms  the  ingenuity,  the 
variety,  and  the  forcible  description  with  which  it  abounded. 
But  we  can  easily  conceive  that  a  sermon  of  this  character 
which  would  be  powerful  and  useful  preached  from  the 
heart  of  a  man  glowing  like  Paul  with  love  to  the  souls  of 
his  audience,  might  not  be  so  well  fitted  for  the  press, 
without  the  tones  and  persuasions  of  the  preacher.     Mr. 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  317 

Foster  advised  him  to  keep  it  without  printing,  and  told 
him  he  was  afraid  that  those  who  had  expatiated  most  on 
infernal  subjects  had  felt  them  the  least.  But  he  did  not 
tell  him,  as  he  did  forty  years  afterwards  the  student  in 
theology,  that  if  the  tremendous  doctrine  were  true,  surely 
it  ought  to  be  almost  continually  proclaimed  as  with  the 
blast  of  a  trumpet,  inculcated  and  reiterated,  with  ardent 
passion,  in  every  possible  form  of  terrible  illustration.  But 
he  said  that  it  struck  him  as  a  kind  of  Christian  cruelty 
to  go  into  such  illustration,  and  he  gave  an  opinion  in 
regard  to  the  voice  of  the  New  Testament  on  the  subject, 
which  for  the  sake  of  comparison  and  contrast  we  place 
beside  his  opinion  on  the  same  at  a  later  period. 

1801.  1841. 

The  utmost  space  I  would  allot  in  I  do  say,  that  to  make  the  milder 
my  writings  to  this  part  of  the  revela-  suasives,  the  gentle  language  of  love, 
tions  of  our  religion,  should  not,  at  the  main  resource,  is  not  in  consis- 
any  rate.  exr;,ed  the  proportion  which  tency  with  the  spirit  of  the  Bible,  in 
in  the  New  Testament  this  part  of  which  the  larger  proportion  of  what 
truth  bears  to  the  whole  of  the  sacred  is  said  of  sinners,  and  addressed  to 
book,  the  grand  predominant  spirit  of  them,  is  plainly  in  a  tone  of  menace 
which  is  love  and  mercy.  and  alarm.     Strange  if  it  had  been 

otherwise,  when  a  righteous  Governor 
was  speaking  to  a  depraved,  rebel- 
lious race. 

It  would  seem  that  Foster  had  not,  on  this  subject,  come 
to  the  Scripures  to  settle  his  mind  there,  with  the  same 
unhesitating  acquiescence  and  faith,  with  which  he  received 
from  the  same  Scriptures  the  doctrine  of  a  suffering  Me- 
diator. And  it  would  seem  that  he  had  not  looked  very 
narrowly  into  the  profound  and  fundamental  connection  of 
the  great  truths  of  the  Gospel  scheme  with  one  another, 
and  their  mutual  dependence  on  each  other  for  their  sep- 
arate demonstration,  sanction  and  power.  He  was  not 
what  can  be  called  a  profound  theologian,  neither  in  the 
Scriptures,  nor  in  the  systematic  study  of  theology.  Ho 
never  pretended  tal^^v  Nor  is  this  a  derogation  from  the 


318  LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

greatness  of  his  merit  and  the  originality  and  power  of  his 
thoughts  as  a  practical  writer  ;  though  we  love  to  see  the 
tide  of  practical  thought  and  emotion  sustained,  compressed, 
and,  so  to  speak,  flung  back  upon  itself,  by  a  rock-bound 
coast  of  theoretical  systematic  truth,  which  offers  points  of 
command  over  the  ocean,  and  strong  harbors  where  the 
soul  may  securely  ride  at  anchor.  But  Foster  carried  his 
mental  independence,  and  his  hatred  of  the  restraint  of 
systems,  to  the  verge  of  error.  He  w^ould  have  been  a 
more  useful  preacher,  a  more  massive  thinker,  a  more  com- 
prehensive writer,  had  his  mind,  from  an  early  period,  been 
more  deeply  imbedded  in  the  knowledge  of  the  Scriptures. 
On  whatever  point  a  man's  anchorage  does  not  hold,  there 
his  reasoning  is  unsafe. 

That  Foster  could  have  reasoned  on  the  ground  of  mere 
prejudice  and  doubt,  without  taking  into  view  known  and 
admitted  facts  and  relations,  would  have  seemed  incredible. 
And  yet  in  the  instance  of  the  future  retribution  he  has 
done  it.  He  has  adopted  a  line  of  reasoning  with  an  ad- 
mission in  the  course  of  it  fatal  to  the  very  principle  of 
the  argument ;  a  line  of  reasoning  taking  up  in  its  course 
a  mighty  fact  to  support  it,  which  overthrows  it  completely 
from  its  very  foundation.  He  brings  in  the  agency  of 
Satan,  the  intervention  and  activity  of  the  great  Tempter 
and  Destroyer,  to  lessen  our  sense  of  the  desert  of  endless 
punishment  in  man,  and  thus  to  make  the  truth  of  such 
punishment  appear  inconsistent  with  the  Divine  goodness ; 
not  appearing  to  remember  that  the  admission  of  the  truth 
of  the  Scriptures  in  regard  to  the  existence  and  agency  of 
such  a  Tempter  and  Destroyer,  is  inevitably  the  admission 
of  an  eternal  state  of  sin  and  suffering ;  which  is  as  incon- 
sistent with  the  Divine  benevolence  in  reference  to  Satan 
and  the  fallen  angels,  as  it  would  be  with  reference  to  man. 
Eternal  retribution  being  once  admitted  in  reference  to  any 
created  sinful  intelligences,  must  be  admitted  in  reference 
to  all ;  the  disproportion  between  endless  misery  and  any 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER,  319 

limited  duration  of  punishment  being  infinitely  greater 
than  any  possible  disproportion  between  the  guilt  of  one 
class  of  finite  sinful  intelligences  and  another  class.  It 
could  not  possibly  consist  with  the  Divine  benevolence,  to 
punish  one  class  of  sinners  eternally,  and  not  another. 
Admitting,  therefore,  the  sin  and  the  punishment  of  Satan, 
you  have  overthrown  the  very  foundation  of  any  argument 
against  the  Divine  benevolence,  from  the  truth  of  eternal 
retribution  as  propounded  in  the  Scriptures.  This  Mr. 
Foster  has  done ;  taking  up  thus  into  the  texture  of  his 
argument  (which,  indeed,  is  but  a  texture  of  doubts  and 
reasonings  from  mere  emotion)  a  fact  that  rots  the  whole 
of  it,  a  single  thread  that  turns  it  all  to  dust.  It  is  as  if 
a  man  should  attempt  to  pass  off  as  a  costly  antique^  a  vase 
that  has  on  it  the  name  of  the  manufacturer  at  Potsdam. 
It  is  like  the  attempt  to  prove  that  Moses  was  mistaken 
in  the  date  of  the  world  by  a  temple  alleged  to  have  been 
built  before  the  deluge,  but  in  which  a  hieroglyph ical  in- 
scription being  read,  fixes  the  time  of  its  erection  under 
the  Roman  Empire.  Bringing  up  Satan  as  the  Tempter 
of  man,  to  prop  up  an  argument  against  Eternal  Retribu- 
tion as  inconsistent  with  the  benevolence  of  God,  Mr. 
Foster  has  merely  produced  an  instance  of  an  intelligent, 
sinful  being,  actually  suffering  such  retribution ;  an  in- 
stance which  inspiration  itself  lays  hold  of  to  prove  the 
certainty  of  such  retribution,  in  the  case  of  wicked  men. 
"  For  if  God  spared  not  the  angels  that  sinned,  but  cast 
them  down  to  hell,  the  Lord  knoweth  how  to  reserve  the 
unjust  unto  the  Day  of*  Judgment,  to  be  punished."  We 
take  the  case  of  Satan  as  being,  in  Mr.  Foster's  argument, 
a  case  of  eternal  retribution ;  for  we  do  not  suppose  that 
Mr.  Foster  would  have  admitted  a  possibility  of  Satan  ever 
being  converted,  or  as  he  would  rather  have  phrased  it, 
ever  being  brought  under  the  economy  of  grace.  The 
existence  of  an  immortal  being  so  malignant  as  to  make 
the  perdition  of  immortal  beings  his  delight,  is  the  exist- 


320  LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

ence  of  eternal  sin  and  misery ;  and  that  being  given,  the 
argument  against  the  Divine  goodness  from  eternal  retribu- 
tion, is  as  futile  as  would  be  an  argument  against  the 
Divine  existence  from  the  alleged  eternity  of  matter. 

The  great  truth  of  the  atonement  was  another  admitted, 
practical,  sun-like  fact,  which  Foster  held,  most  fully  and 
firmly,  but  yet  maintained  an  absolute  insensibility  to  its 
bearing  upon  this  point  of  an  endless  retribution.  Either 
there  was  a  voluntary  absence  and  denial  of  any  effort  of 
his  attention  that  way,  an  anxious  withdrawal  of  his  mind 
from  that  conclusion,  almost  as  if  he  had  said  within  him- 
self, '' That  way  madness  lies;"  or  there  was  an  original 
defectiveness  in  his  reception  of  the  doctrine,  a  sheer  cut- 
ting away  of  the  whole  of  one  side  of  the  atonement  from 
his  moral  vision.  His  reasoning  on  one  divine  truth  apart 
from  its  connection  with  and  dependence  on  another,  was 
as  if  a  natural  philosopher  should  reason  on  the  motion  of 
the  tides,  without  taking  into  consideration  the  influence 
of  the  moon  ;  or  should  undertake  to  predict  the  moon's 
changes,  without  considering  her  position  with  respect  to 
the  sun. 

There  are  three  ways  in  which  the  Atonement  may  be 
disposed  of  to  favor  the  doctrine  of  universal  salvation. 
The  first  is  the  utter  denial  and  rejection  of  it,  as  needless 
in  the  government  of  God,  and  in  the  economy  of  the 
human  system.  This  summary  mode  is  in  favor  with 
many. 

The  second  expedient  is  to  extend  the  virtue  of  the 
Atonement  over  the  whole  human  race,  irrespective  of 
moral  character,  as  also  of  the  question  whether  the  expe- 
dient of  salvation  offered  to  the  race  is  accepted  of  by  them. 
But  a  God  who  could  save  men  without  repentence,  might 
as  well  have  saved  them  without  an  atonement.  This 
second  expedient  was  not  admitted  by  Mr.  Foster,  for  he 
made  eternal  salvation  dependent  on  the  condition  of  re- 
pentance and  faith. 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  321 

The  third  plan  is,  that  of  saving  some  by  the  Atone- 
ment through  faith,  and  leaving  the  rest  to  be  saved  by- 
suffering  the  penalty  of  the  Divine  law,  that  penalty,  as 
pretended,  not  being  eternal.  This  seems  to  have  been  the 
view  taken  by  Mr.  Foster.  On  the  least  profound  exami- 
nation it  is  full  of  palpable  absurdities.  The  idea  of  an 
atonement  at  all,  if  salvation  could  come  in  any  other  way,  is 
absurd.  The  idea  of  an  atonement  for  some,  and  purgatory 
for  others,  is  absurd.  The  idea  of  an  atonement  because  the 
Divine  attributes  required  it,  is  rendered  absurd  by  the  sup- 
position of  the  salvation  of  some  without  it.  If  any  could  be 
saved  by  punishment  irrespective  of  an  atonement,  nay,  hav- 
ing despised  and  rejected  an  atonement,  why  not  all  ?  The 
idea  of  the  innocent  suffering  for  the  guilty  is  absurd,  if  the 
guilty  can  be  saved  by  suffering  for  themselves.  The  idea 
of  the  innocent  suffering  for  the  guilty  because  God  could 
not  save  them  in  any  other  way  consistent  with  the  honor 
of  eternal  justice,  is  made  perfectly  absurd  the  moment 
you  suppose  any  to  be  saved  through  their  own  suffering. 
But  such  is  the  case  with  those  who  suffer  the  penalty  of 
the  divine  law,  if  that  penalty  be  not  endless.  They  serve 
out  their  time,  they  sin,  and  suffer  for  it  the  appointed 
measure  of  suffering,  and  are  restored.  Suffering  is  their 
savior,  irrespective  of  an  atonement.  They  have  nothing 
to  do  with  Christ. 

But  the  only  ground  on  which  divine  revelation  propounds 
the  atonement  by  the  innocent  suffering  for  the  guilty,  is 
because  it  was  not  consistent  with  the  divine  attributes  to 
pardon  the  guilty  in  any  other  way.  "  For  myself,"  says 
Mr.  Foster,  "  I  never  feel  any  difficulty  in  conceiving  that 
while  the  Divine  mercy  would  save  guilty  beings  from  de- 
served punishment,  it  should  yet  be  absolutely  necessary  to 
the  honor  of  eternal  justice  that  an  awful  infliction  should 
fall  somewhere."  But  in  Foster's  plan  it  falls  both  upon 
the  innocent  and  the  guilty ;  for  while  he  supposes  those 
who  trust  in  the  sufferings  of  the  innocent  to  be  saved  by 

14# 


332  LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

them^  be  also  supposes  those  who  do  not  trust  in  those  suf- 
ferings, but  despise  them,  to  be  saved  by  tlieir  own,  saved 
by  the  endurance  of  the  penalty  of  the  law,  which,  they 
might  say,  we  can  well  afford  to  endure,  there  being  an 
eternity  of  blessedness  afterwards.  The  idea  of  an  atone- 
ment for  part  of  the  human  race,  and  salvation  for  the  rest 
by  limited  suffering,  is  well  nigh  the  most  absurd  that  ever 
was  broached  in  all  theological  speculation.  And  yet  this 
is  absolutely  Mr.  Foster's  idea,  believing,  as  he  seems  to 
have  endeavored  to  do,  that  all  mankind  will  be  saved  after 
a  limited  endurance  of  the  penalty. 

A  limited  endurance  of  the  penalty !  Here  we  strike 
upon  another  remarkable  inconsistency  in  Mr.  Foster's 
mind  and  train  of  reasoning  ;  remarkable  for  him,  because 
it  could  not  have  been  supposed  that  a  severely  disciplined 
mind  would  have  admitted  it.  He  institutes  a  moral  ar- 
gument from  "  the  stupendous  idea  of  eternity,"  and  he 
goes  the  whole  length  of  supposing  that  man's  necessary 
ignorance  and  narrow  faculty  of  apprehending  it  precludes 
him  from  having  a  competent  notion  of  it,  and  so  inevitably 
prevents  the  salotary  force  of  an  impression  from  the  threat 
of  an  eternal  retribution.  But  if  incompetent  to  comprehend 
the  idea  of  unlimited  duration  of  punishment,  then  neces- 
sarily incompetent  to  apprehend  any  approximation  to  that 
idea,  and  consequently  the  smaller  and  more  limited  the 
nature  of  the  threatened  retribution,  the  more  powerful  its 
effect  upon  the  mind.  The  power  of  the  impression  increases 
in  an  inverse  ratio  to  the  magnitude  of  the  danger.  This 
is  a  strict  and  inevitable  result  from  Foster's  reasoning. 
He  endeavors  to  institute  a  series  of  approximations  to  the 
idea  of  eternal  misery,  and  then  showing  that  they  all  fail, 
he  demands  that  man,  if  there  is  an  eternal  retribution  for 
sin,  "  be  apprized  of  the  nature  and  measure  of  the  penal 
consequence."  He  intimates  that  it  is  something  ''  totally 
out  of  the  scope  of  his  faculties  to  apprehend,"  and  therefore 
unfit  to  deter  him. 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  323 

But  what  is  it  about  which  Mr.  Foster  is  reasoning,  and 
on  which,  in  its  very  definiteness  and  supremacy  of  horror, 
he  founds  his  whole  argument  against  the  doctrine,  as 
against  the  goodness  of  God  ?  Why,  it  is  the  actual,  over- 
whelming and  intolerable  dreadfulness  of  this  very  judg- 
ment, of  eternal  miser}^ ;  a  thing  so  overwhelming  and  in- 
tolerable, that  the  human  soul  starts  back  from  it  aghast. 
It  is  then,  after  all,  a  thing  of  which  the  human  soul  may 
form  a  very  definite  conception  ;  and  the  consequence  in- 
evitably is  that  it  is  of  all  things  the  best  adapted  to  deter 
the  soul  from  sin.  And  if  that  soul  can  form  such  a  con- 
ception of  it  as  to  reason  against  it,  because  it  is  so  su- 
premely horrible,  it  must,  if  once  admitted  on  the  authority 
of  God,  constitute  a  deterring  impression  against  sin,  of  an 
energy  that  all  the  motives  in  the  universe  cannot  equal. 

Mr.  Foster's  reasoning  oversets  itself  at  every  step ;  and 
if  this  be  the  material  out  of  which  the  private  conversations 
of  unbelief  in  eternal  retribution,  of  which  he  speaks  as 
among  certain  ministers,  were  composed,  we  wonder  at  the 
occultation  of  reason  which  must,  on  this  subject,  have 
come  over  the  intellectual  circle.  Nor  can  we  conceive  in 
what  school  of  intellectual  philosophy  a  circle  of  minds 
could  have  been  disciplined,  to  reason  so  disastrously  con- 
cerning those  spiritual  ideas,  which  are  the  birthright  and 
possession  of  the  soul  in  its  very  constitution.  The  idea  of 
eternity  is  perhaps  the  simplest  and  most  omnipresent  of  all 
our  ideas ;  the  easiest  to  be  appealed  to,  the  most  universal  ^ 
and  absolute  ;  pervading  the  mind  like  an  unconscious  at- 
mosphere, and  brooding  over  it  even  more  constitutionally 
than  the  idea  of  the  immortality  of  the  soul.  Eternity  is, 
indeed,  a  simple  idea,  one  of  the  inevitable  forms  in  which 
the  human  reason  works,  if  it  works  at  all.  There  is  no 
possible  approximation  to  it,  or  forming  of  it,  by  measures 
or  degrees ;  the  soul  overleaps  them  all,  and  is  beyond 
them  ;  it  is  there  in  eternity,  it  was  there  before  them. 
They  may  help  to  awaken  the  congciousness  of  the  soul, 


324  LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

and  quicken  its  sensibilities,  but  they  cannot  give  the  idea  ; 
just  as  a  galvanic  machine  may  quicken  a  palsied  nerve, 
but  cannot  impart  or  create  life.  It  is  in  the  soul,  a  law 
and  development  of  its  reason,  or  computations  could  no 
more  impart  it,  than  they  could  to  the  beasts  that  perish. 
Mr.  Foster  says,  "  all  that  is  within  human  capacity  is  to 
imagine  the  vastest  measures  of  tinie^  and  to  look  to  the 
termination  of  these,  as  only  touching  the  mere  commence- 
ment of  eternity."  But  the  absolute  falsity  of  this  propo- 
sition in  the  philosophy  of  the  human  mind  is  quite  demon- 
strable. It  reminds  us  of  a  humorous  and  powerful  exhi- 
bition of  its  absurdity  by  John  Paul  Richter. 

Nor  is  the  "  feeble  efficacy  of  the  terrible  doctrine  itself 
as  notionally  admitted"  owing  to  any  incompetency  in  the 
mind  to  apprehend  it ;  for  this  would  convey  a  dread  im- 
putation indeed  against  the  goodness  and  justice  of  the  Cre- 
ator, in  putting  under  an  eternal  moral  accountability  a 
race  of  creatures  whom  he  had  made  absolutely  incompe- 
tent to  apprehend  the  idea  of  eternity !  And  this  is  but 
one  of  the  monstrous  consequences,  which  would  follow 
from  Mr.  Foster's  argument ;  the  grossest  fatuity,  we  had 
almost  said,  that  ever  a  great  intellect  was  betrayed  into. 

But  the  feebleness  of  that  efficacy  is  owing  to  the  volun- 
tary moral  insensibility  of  the  soul  to  all  spiritual  ideas  and 
apprehensions ;  a  consequence  of  its  depravity  and  not  of 
its  constitution.  And  that  depravity  is  such,  that  we  ap- 
prehend present  self-interest  outweighs  even  the  considera- 
tion of  eternal  consequences,  unseen,  and  infinitely  more 
so  of  any  merely  limited  consequences.  The  habit  of 
looking  at  and  living  for  the  things  which  are  seen  and 
temporal  produces  an  utter  insensibility  to  the  things  un- 
seen and  eternal ;  so  that,  though  the  idea  of  eternity  is 
full,  clear,  and  simple  in  the  intellect,  it  is  not  admitted 
into  the  heart ;  there  is  a  disconnection  between  it,  and  the 
raotical  affections,  as  between  the  brain  and  the  nerves  in 
.pase  of  some  forms  of  paralysis.     But  still  the  idea 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  325 

rules  as  a  monarch  in  the  intellect,  and  exerts  in  its  turn 
a  paralyzing  power  over  all  motives,  all  forms  of  induce- 
ment, addressed  to  the  soul  as  based  upon  anything  less 
than  eternity.  The  idea  of  eternity  in  the  soul  reduces 
to  ashes,  as  an  omnipotent  magician,  whatever  accumula- 
tions, either  of  horrors  or  beatitudes,  may  be  attempted  be- 
fore it  in  any  duration  short  of  eternity.  Such  tricks  of 
accumulation,  though  the  forces  of  the  planetary  universe 
were  called  in  aid  of  the  computation,  as  Foster  has  done, 
are  as  a  hollow  jugglery,  which  the  soul  sees  through  in  an 
instant,  and  darts  beyond,  infinitely  out  of  the  reach  of  all 
limited  efficacy.  So  that  it  may  with  truth  be  said  that  a 
being  to  whom  God  has  given  the  idea  of  eternity,  is  ab- 
solutely beyond  the  reach  of  efficacy  even  by  omnipotence, 
with  anything  less  than  eternity.  A  mind  with  all  the 
intense  energy  of  thought  and  language,  and  all  the  power 
of  imagery,  that  npt  only  Foster,  but  an  archangel  could 
command,  might  exhaust  itself  in  piling  horrors  upon  hor- 
rors, with  all  forms  of  illustration  supplied  by  the  universe, 
and  all  exclamations  of  dread  before  the  misery  of  incom- 
putable ages  of  torment;  but  the  soul,  darting  into  the  eter- 
nity beyond,  exulting  spreads  its  wings  in  triumph  :  and 
laughs  at  the  scarecrows  of  a  limited  duration.  A  depraved 
man,  assured  of  an  eternity  of  blessedness,  will  be  affected 
by  nothing  less  than  an  eternity  of  misery.  It  is  absolutely 
in  this  way  that  the  power  of  this  idea  of  eternity  is  most 
thoroughly  tested  among  mortals,  by  its  rendering  ineffica- 
cious all  ideas  but  those  drawn  from  eternity,  and  on  the 
other  hand,  the  power  of  human  depravity  is  tested  and 
demonstrated  in  this,  more  than  anything  else — its  power  to 
render  the  inducements  of  eternity  itself  absolutely  ineffica- 
cious unless  wielded  by  the  Almighty. 

There  is  in  one  of  Mr.  Foster's  valuable  articles  on 
Chalmer's  Astronomical  Discourses  a  most  impressive  ar- 
gument as  to  the  necessity  of  an  eternal  and  infinite  demon- 
stration of  the   Divine   Omni])otence   and  Wisdom,  by  a 


326  LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

practical  boundlessness  in  the  created  universe  ;  the  mighty 
tracts  of  creation  sweeping  endlessly  along,  and  merging 
into  an  awful  and  mysterious  infinity.  The  greatest  of 
created  beings  will  never  to  all  eternity  be  able  to  survey 
the  whole  of  the  material  creation.  "  For  must  it  not  be 
one  great  object  in  the  Creator's  design,  that  this  magni- 
tude should  make  a  sublime  and  awful  impression  on  his 
intelligent  creatures  ?  But  if  the  magnitude  is  to  mako 
this  impression,  what  would  be  the  impression  made  on 
created  spirits  by  their  coming  to  the  end,  the  boundary, 
of  this  magnitude  ?  It  is  palpable  that  this  latter  impres- 
sion must  counteract  the  former.  So  that  if  the  stupen- 
dous extension  of  the  works  of  God  was  intended  and 
adapted  to  promote,  in  the  contemplations  of  the  highest 
intelligences,  an  infinitely  glorious,  though  still  incompe- 
tent conception  of  the  Divine  infinity,  the  ascertaining  of 
the  limit,  the  distinct  perception  of  the  finiteness,  of  that 
manifestation  of  power,  would  tend  with  a  dreadful  force 
to  repress  and  annihilate  that  conception ;  and  it  may  well 
be  imagined  that  if  an  exalted  adoring  spirit  could  ever  in 
eternity  find  itself  at  that  limit,  the  perception  would  in- 
flict inconceivable  horror."  Each  of  the  elements  of  the 
manifestation  of  an  Infinite  Being,  therefore,  Mr.  Foster 
argues,  will  have  a  practical  infiniteness  relative  to  the  ca- 
pacities of  his  intelligent  creatures  ;  and  the  universe  itself 
must  be  one,  of  which  it  shall  not  be  within  the  possibili' 
ties  of  any  intelligence  less  than  the  infinite  to  know  the 
termination. 

Now  this  is  truly  important  and  powerful  as  to  the  true 
nature  of  our  idea  of  eternity,  and  the  worthlessness  of  any 
impression  as  a  motive  on  the  soul  of  an  immortal  being, 
which  does  not  coincide  in  its  extent  with  its  own  and  the 
Divine  existence.  If  this  reasoning  holds  good  in  regard  to 
God's  Omnipotence,  much  more  in  regard  to  his  moral 
perfections.  If  the  utmost  conception  of  creative  vastness 
and  glory  possible  to  a  created  mind,  would  be  reduced  to 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  327 

an  overwhelming  impression  of  littleness  on  coming  to  the 
absolute  limit  of  its  display  in  the  bosom  of  eternity,  how 
much  more  in  regard  to  any  and  every  manifestation  of 
God's  moral  attributes. 

If  an  adequate  impression  of  the  Divine  perfection  of 
omnipotence  be  required  to  be  produced,  Foster's  reasoning 
shows  that  anything  absolutely  short  of  eternity  is  nothing ; 
nay,  is  of  a  force  the  contrary  way.  And  so,  if  an  adequate 
impression  of  the  Divine  holiness  is  requisite  in  the  sanc- 
tions of  the  Divine  law,  anything  short  of  eternity  in  that 
is  equally  of  force  the  contrary  way.  If  an  adequate  im- 
pression of  terror  for  sinful  beings  under  a  respite  of  mercy 
on  certain  conditions  be  required,  an  adequate  deterring  im- 
pression by  the  penalty  of  the  law,  Foster's  own  reasoning 
shows  that  anything  short  of  eternity  would  fail.  The  eter- 
nal and  infinite  dread  fulness  of  disobedience  could  not  be 
shown  by  anything  less  than  eternal  suffering  on  account 
of  disobedience;  the  eternal  and  infinite  dreadfulness  and 
terribleness  of  sin,  if  required  to  be  manifested  in  extent, 
would  sink  into  an  impression  of  nothingness,  when  the 
absolute  limit  of  the  evil  should  be  reached. 

And  the  experiment  having  once  been  tried,  we  can  as- 
sume with  certainty  that  the  universe  of  created  intelli- 
gences would  feel  released  from  all  fear  of  God  as  to  any 
consequences  of  rebellion  against  him.  The  penalty  would 
be  the  scorn  of  all  evil  beings,  and  no  object,  either  of  soli- 
citude, of  confidence,  or  of  reverence,  to  good  beings.  The 
arrival  at  the  end  of  it  would  inflict  inconceivable  horror  on 
those  spirits  who  have  looked  to  it  as  the  manifestation  of 
the  Divine  holiness  and  justice,  and  the  protection  of  them- 
selves, and  of  the  interests  of  the  universe  against  the  en- 
croachments of  sin,  and  would  fill  with  inconceivable  exul- 
tation and  delight  those  spirits,  who,  in  spite  of  its  threaten- 
ings,  have  dared  to  rebel.  And  we  can  conceive  of  a  period 
in  duration,  from  which  all  that  has  been  passed  through  of 
suffering,  though  in  a  circle  of  ages  beyond  the  possibility 


328  LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

of  human  computation,  would  be  looked  upon  as  less  than 
the  remembrance,  by  a  man  on  the  verge  of  three  score 
years  and  ten,  of  the  sting  of  a  wasp,  or  the  minutest  emo- 
tion of  sorrow  in  his  childhood. 

But  if  the  creation  of  the  universe  be  assumed  as  under- 
taken for  the  display  of  the  Divine  perfections,  the  govern- 
ment of  that  universe  by  rewards  and  punishments  must  be 
so  assumed,  much  more.  And  consequently,  on  Foster's 
own  reasoning,  the  extent  of  such  display  in  each  of  these 
directions,  in  each  of  the  elements  of  the  manifestation  of  an 
Infinite  Being,  must  have  a  practical  infiniteness,  relative 
to  the  capacities  of  his  intelligent  creatures ;  and  the  demon- 
stration of  the  terribleness  of  sin,  and  of  God's  holiness  and 
justice  in  the  punishment  of  sin,  must  be  one,  of  which  it 
shall  not  be  within  the  possibilities  of  any  intelligence  less 
than  the  Infinite  to  know  the  termination.  .We  wonder 
that  this  necessary  consequence  of  Foster's  argument  should 
not  have  occurred  to  his  own  mind,  when  pressed  with  doubt 
and  difficulty  in  the  doctrine  of  eternal  punishment. 

Some  of  the  questions  respecting  our  state  in  the  future 
world,  which  Foster  was  ever  proposing  to  his  own  mind, 
are  comparatively  trifling,  though  invested  with  a  solemn 
curiosity  of  spirit  that  communicates  its  own  mysterious 
shade  to  every  article  of  inquiry  ;  reminding  us  of  the  illus- 
tration, which  Coleridge  has  somewhere  used,  that  the 
colors  of  the  chameleon  darken  in  the  shadow  of  him  who 
bends  over  to  look  at  it.  So  the  mind  of  Mr.  Foster  sees 
in  the  eternal  world  a  reflection  of  his  own  dim  imaginings, 
instead  of  the  realities  which  a  man  may  and  must  see,  if 
he  looks  through  the  telescope  of  God's  Word,  and  not  the 
smoky  glass  of  his  own  fancies.  Mr.  Foster's  letter  to  Rev. 
Mr.  Clowes,  the  213th  in  the  biographical  collection,  writ- 
ten in  the  70th  year  of  his  life,  in  regard  to  the  intermediate 
state,  is  an  interesting  exhibition  of  the  posture  of  his  spirit. 
He  sets  out  with  "  assuming  in  entire  confidence  the  soul's 
consciousness  after  death  ;  this  is  implied  in  many  passages 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  329 

of  Scripture ;  but  a  number  of  them,  often  cited,  assert  it 
in  so  plain  a  manner,  that  nothing  but  the  most  resolute 
perversity  of  criticism  can  attempt  to  invalidate  them." 

And  could  Mr.  Foster  have  admitted  anything  less  than-' 
this,  concerning  the  number  and  vast  variety  of  passages 
which  teach  so  clearly  the  doctrine  of  an  eternal  retribution  ? 
On  some  of  those  passages  the  very  truth  of  the  soul's  con- 
sciousness after  death  hinges.  Why  did  not  Mr.  Foster 
apply  his  canon  of  judgment  to  the  consideration  of  eternal 
retribution,  asserted  in  those  passages  in  so  plain  a  manner 
that  nothing  but  the  most  resolute  perversity  of  criticism 
can  attempt  to  invalidate  them  ? 

But  he  goes  on  in  this  interesting  letter,  to  present  a 
variety  of  questions,  which  he  would  put  to  a  messenger 
from  the  unseen  world,  could  he  have  such  an  one  to  con- 
verse with,  and  intimates  his  opinion  that  we  are,  by  some 
punitive  dispensation,  "  denied  such  a  knowledge  of  the  in- 
visible world,  as  would  have  tended  to  make  the  prospect  of 
that  world  more  influentially  impressive." 

In  view  of  such  a  singular  position  as  this,  we  cannot  but 
bring  a  previous  state  of  Mr.  Foster's  own  mind  in  contrast 
with  it.  There  is  a  most  striking  passage  in  his  introduc- 
tion to  Doddridge's  Rise  and  Progress,  in  which  he  dwells 
upon  the  mighty  assemblage  of  considerations,  that  should 
irresistibly  compel  a  careless  soul  to  thoughtfulness,  but  to 
which  it  is  insensible.  "  The  very  emanations  of  heaven, 
radiating  downwards  to  where  you  dwell,  are  intercepted 
and  do  not  reach  you.  It  is  the  frequent  reflection  of  a 
thoughtful  mind  in  observing  you, — what  ideas,  what  truths, 
what  mighty  appeals,  belong  to  the  condition  of  this  one 
man  and  of  that,  devoted  and  enslaved  to  the  world  ?  Oh  ! 
why  is  it  impossible  to  bring  them  into  application  ?  A 
few  minutes  of  time  would  be  sufficient  for  the  annuncia- 
tion of  what,  if  it  could  be  received  by  them  in  its  simple, 
unexaggerated  importance,  would  stop  that  one  man's  gay 
career,  as  if  a  great  serpent  had  raised  its  head  in  his  path  ; 


330  LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

would  confound  that  other's  calculation  for  emolument ; 
would  bring  a  sudden  dark  eclipse  on  that  third  man's  vis- 
ions of  fame  ;  would  tear  them  all  from  their  inveterate  and 
almost  desperate  combination  with  what  is  to  perish,  and 
amidst  their  surprise  and  terror  would  excite  an  emotion  of 
joy  that  they  had  been  dissevered  before  it  was  too  late, 
from  an  object  that  was  carrying  them  down  a  rapid  declina- 
tion towards  destruction.  And  the  chief  of  these  things, 
so  potent  if  applied,  are  not  withheld  as  if  secreted  and 
silent  in  some  dark  cloud,  front  ivhich  loe  had  to  invoke 
them  to  break  forth  in  lightning:  they  are  actually  ex- 
hibited in  the  Divine  revelation.'^'' 

There  are,  then,  things  enough  revealed  from  that  invis- 
ible world,  emanations  from  Heaven  radiating  downwards, 
alarming  ideas  and  mighty  appeals  enough,  if  men  would 
look  at  them,  to  render  the  prospect  of  that  world  so  influ- 
entially  impressive,  that  if  a  bolt  of  thunder  had  fallen,  or 
the  ground  had  opened  at  his  feet,  or  a  great  serpent  had 
reared  its  head  in  his  path,  it  would  not  tend  more  cer- 
tainly to  arrest  our  steps,  to  tear  us  from  our  desperate 
combination  with  what  is  to  perish.  And  these  things  are 
not  withheld,  secreted,  or  silent  in  a  dark  cloud,  but  they 
actually  break  forth  in  lightning  from  the  Divine  revela- 
tion !  This  is  the  impression  of  a  mind  beholding  these 
things  itself,  and  endeavoring  to  take  hold  of  them,  to  turn 
them,  as  by  an  infallible  and  potent  conductor  of  the  light- 
ning, upon  the  insensible  minds  of  others.  Mr.  Foster,  in 
this  state  of  open  spiritual  vision,  sees  through  the  Word 
of  God  these  "  mighty  truths,  requisitions,  overtures,  prom- 
ises, portents,  menaces,  close  to  the  sinner,  suspended  just 
over  him,  of  a  nature  to  demolish  the  present  state  of  his 
mind,  if  brought  in  contact  with  it,"  and  the  insensibility  of 
the  man  amidst  all  this,  is  with  him  a  matter  of  "  indignant 
speculation,"  and  he  is  '*  excited  to  a  benevolent  impatience, 
a  restless  wish,  that  things  so  near  and  important  to  the 
man  should   take  hold  upon  him."      He  wishes  that  an 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  331 

austere  apparition,  as  from  the  dead,  might  accost  him, 
who  is  living  as  if  life  were  never  to  have  an  end  ! 

This  is  the  mood  of  mind,  this  the  state  of  vision,  this 
the  anxiety  of  heart,  in  a  man  endeavoring  to  urge  upon 
others  the  importance  of  religion.  But  how  different  the 
speculative  letter  of  the  same  being  at  seventy  years  of  age. 
He  wishes  for  something  from  the  invisible  world,  more 
influentially  impressive  !  He  begs  for  a  few  of  the  special 
facts  of  that  world,  ''that  might  keep  our  minds  directed 
under  a  graver  impression,  to  a  preparation  for  it."  And 
with  the  declaration  of  our  Saviour  directly  before  his 
mind, — neither  would  they  believe,  though  one  rose  from 
the  dead, — he  endeavors  to  diminish  the  amount  of  the 
meaning  of  that  declaration,  to  what  is  barely  and  abso- 
lutely necessary  to  understand  by  it.  A  state  of  mind  so 
singularly  obstinate  against  any  but  compulsory  conviction, 
assuredly  comes  near  to  that  very  disease  of  unbelief,  of 
which  our  Saviour  speaks.  What  revelation  could  be 
made  to  satisfy  it  ?  Here  again  is  Thomas  among  the 
disciples.  Believe  on  such  evidence  ?  Show  me  the  print 
of  the  nails,  and  let  me  thrust  my  hand  into  his  side  ! 

Mr.  Foster  goes  on.  "  We  must  submit  to  feel  that  we 
are  in  the  dark.  ...  A  contemplative  spirit  hovers  with 
insuppressible  inquisitiveness  about  the  dark  frontier,  beyond 
which  it  knows  that  wonderful  realities  are  existing — reali- 
ties of  greater  importance  to  it  than  the  whole  world  on  this 
side  of  that  limit.  We  watch  for  some  glimpse  through 
any  part  of  the  solemn  shade."  Would  not  one  imagine 
that  he  were  in  the  presence  of  some  highly-cultivated  and 
powerful  pagan  mind,  without  a  revelation,  soliloquizing  on 
the  unimaginable  future,  as  a  dark,  unfathomed,  palpable 
obscure,  rather  than  listening  to  the  speculations  of  the 
greatest  minds  in  the  world,  under  the  full  light  of  the 
Christian  dispensation  !  This  is  one  of  the  most  remark- 
able examples  on  record  of  that  perversity  of  mind,  which 
suffers  its  ignorance  and  impatience  about  that  which  is 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

unknown,  to  diminish  its  confidence,  and  obscure  its  per- 
ceptions, in  regard  to  that  which  is  known. 

Now,  in  regard  to  the  detail  of  Divine  revelation,  there 
can  be  no  doubt  that  both  the  amount  of  light  given  and 
that  withheld,  the  subjects  made  to  stand  out  in  clearest 
day,  and  those  held  back  in  comparative  obscurity,  the 
degree,  the  distribution,  the  direction  of  that  light,  and  the 
combination  of  light  and  shade,  are  exactly  what  is  re- 
quired for  a  perfect  revelation  to  mortals  in  our  state.  To 
give  the  realities  of  the  future  world  their  full  power  over 
our  minds  in  this  world,  there  must  be  that  sublime  and 
awful  mingling  of  the  definite  with  the  indefinite,  which 
presents  absolute  truth,  but  truth  which  carries  us  wander- 
ing through  eternity ;  there  must  be  that  absence  of  all 
such  exactness,  as  would  make  the  inquisitive  speculator 
say.  Now  I  have  it  all  under  my  command  and  comprehen- 
sion. Had  the  revelation  been  occupied  with  answers  to 
such  inquiries  as  Mr.  Foster  demanded,  its  power  over  the 
soul  would  have  been  immeasurably  lessened.  It  is  the 
solemn  reserve  of  the  Scriptures  in  regard  to  such  compar- 
atively unimportant  questions  and  particulars,  and  their 
solemn  and  awful  fulness  and  clearness  as  to  great  funda- 
mental truths,  tha?t  constitutes  one  of  the  greatest  inciden- 
tal proofs  of  their  Divine  inspiration  ;  their  fulness  on  all 
points  essential  to  the  soul's  eternal  interests  ;  their  reserve 
on  all  points  of  mere  intellectual  and  speculative  inquisi- 
tiveness  ;  on  all  points  on  which  men  would  have  resorted 
to  fulness  and  minuteness  in  their  communications,  on 
purpose  to  excite  and  attract  the  curiosity  and  admiration 
of  mankind.  Revelation  w^ould  have  greatly  lost  its  power 
to  keep  the  mind  directed  under  a  grave  impression  of  pre- 
paration for  the  eternal  world,  if  it  had  been  constructed 
and  arranged  according  to  Mr.  Foster's  demands. 

And  the  nature  of  Mr.  Foster's  own  unsophisticated, 
almost  unconscious  impressions,  and  the  amazing  power 
with  which  he  could  convey  them,  in  regard  to  what  awaits 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  333 

the  soul  in  eternity,  may  be  much  better  learned  from  his 
practical  writings,  than  his  impatient  speculative  question- 
ings. Take,  for  example,  his  incidental  passage  in  regard 
to  the  death  of  Hume.  After  examining  the  manner  of 
the  philosopher  in  meeting  death,  the  low  and  labored  jokes, 
the  suspicious  buffoonery,  by  which  his  companions  could 
be  so  much  diverted,  but  which  looked  much  like  "  the  ex- 
pedient of  a  boy  on  passing  through  some  gloomy  place  in 
the  night,  who  whistles  to  lessen  his  fear,  or  to  persuade 
his  companion  that  he  does  not  feel  it ;"  he  observes  that 
"  to  a  man  who  solemnly  believes  the  truth  of  revelation, 
and  therefore  the  threatenings  of  Divine  vengeance 
against  the  despisers  of  it^  this  scene  will  present  as 
mournful  a  spectacle,  as  perhaps  the  sun  ever  shone  upon. 
"We  here  behold  a  man  of  great  talents  and  invincible  per- 
severance, entering  on  his  career  with  the  profession  of  an 
impartial  inquiry  after  truth,  met  at  every  stage  and  step 
by  the  evidences  and  expostulations  of  religion  and  the 
claims  of  his  Creator,  but  devoting  his  labors  to  the  pur- 
suit of  fame  and  the  promotion  of  impiety,  at  length  ac- 
quiring and  accomplishing,  as  he  declared  himself,  all  he 
had  intended  and  desired,  and  descending  towards  the  close 
of  life  amidst  tranquillity,  widely  extending  reputation,  and 
the  homage  of  the  great  and  the  learned.  We  behold  him 
appointed  soon  to  appear  before  the  Judge,  to  whom  he  had 
never  alluded  but  with  malice  or  contempt ;  yet  preserving 
to  appearance  an  entire  self-complacency,  idly  jesting  about 
his  approaching  dissolution,  and  mingling  with  the  insane 
sport  his  references  to  the  fall  of  superstition,  a  term  of 
which  the  meaning  is  hardly  even  dubious  when  expressed 
by  such  men.  We  behold  him  at  last  carried  off,  and  we 
seem  to  hear,  the  following  moment,  from  the  darkness  in 
which  he  vanishes,  the  shriek  of  surprise  and  terror,  and 
the  overpowering  accents  of  the  messenger  of  vengeance. 
On  the  whole  globe  there  probably  ivas  not  acting  at  the 
time,  as  mournful  a  tragedy  as  that  of  which  the  friends 


334  LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

of  Hume  were  the  spectators,  without  being  aware  that  it 
was  any  tragedy  at  all.'''' 

Now  we  need  not  say  that  the  sentences  in  this  impres- 
sive paragraph  marked  in  italics  convey  a  more  solemn  and 
effective  impression  by  far,  than  if  their  place  had  been 
supplied  by  anything  more  definite.  The  soul  broods  over 
the  awful  undefined  imagery  covered  up  in  darkness,  yet 
half  disclosed  in  light,  behind  which  the  great  fact  of  sud-. 
den  and  terrific  vengeance  rushes  with  overwhelming  cer- 
tainty. 

We  have  spoken  of  the  morbid  passion  for  doubts,  or 
rather,  we  ought  to  say,  the  fascination  by  them,  and  ir- 
resistible drawing  towards  them,  as  a  bird  to  the  glitter  of 
the  serpent's  eye,  beneath  which  the  great  mind  of  Foster 
seemed  sometimes  wrestling.  His  was  not  the  depravity 
of  unbelief,  but  the  temptation.  ''  If  thou  be  the  Son  of 
God,  command  these  stones  that  they  be  made  bread." 
Some  men  feed  upon  doubts,  and  search  for  them,  and 
make  sale  of  them.  And  some  men  pretend  to  sport  with 
them  even  on  the  brink  of  the  grave  ;  "  a  low  vivacity," 
said  Foster,  in  the  case  of  Hume,  "  which  seems  but  like 
the  quickening  corruption  of  a  mind,  whose  faculty  for 
perception  is  putrefying  and  dissolving  even  before  the 
body." 

But  Foster  did  not  seek  for  doubts ;  they  were  borne  in 
upon  him  ;  they  were  a  source  of  anguish  to  him.  A  man 
who  loves  them  is  likely  to  perish  by  them.  We  have 
heard  of  men,  in  search  of  mud-turtles,  held  by  the  viscous 
soil  till  the  tide  flowed  over  them,  and  they  were  drowned  ; 
or  of  men  digging  mud  itself  in  their  boat,  and  sinking 
with  it ;  some  minds  are  swamped  in  the  same  manner. 

There  are  subjects  on  which  it  is  impossible  not  to  doubt; 
and  the  plainest  truths  of  revelation  may  be  driven  to  ex- 
tremes beyond  the  limit  of  human  faculties.  The  attri- 
butes of  God,  and  the  elements  of  our  own  being  may  be 
tortured  with  questions,   that  admit  of  no  other    answer 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  335 

than  an  unquestioning  acquiescence  in  the  Divine  Wis- 
dom. On  some  of  these  questions,  if  created  minds  were 
left  to  themselves  in  controversy,  it  would  be  eternal.  The 
one  party  might  invent  arguments  that  would  seem  in 
their  explosion  to  level  all  the  ranks  of  the  justifiers  of  the 
ways  of  God  to  man,  like  Satan's  new  artillery  against  the 
seried  files  of  angels.  But  they  again  might  be  over- 
wheluKjd  with  arguments  like  the  seated  hills,  and  together 
so  the  war  would  be  eternal.  There  is  nothing  but  the 
coming  of  Messiah  himself  that  can  calm  the  soul,  and 
stay  the  surges  of  its  chaos. 

We  cannot  help  attributing  most  of  the  defects  and 
difficulties  in  Mr.  Foster's  theological  views  to  the  low 
position  he  was  content  to  keep  through  life  in  regard  to 
personal  experience  in  the  great  things  of  religion.  He 
had  but  little  animating  faith  in  the  power  of  religion,  be- 
cause he  looked  at  it  and  experienced  it  more  through  the 
medium  of  human  imperfections,  cares,  anxieties,  troubles, 
distractions,  than  of  Divine  grace.  He  did  not  look  into 
the  perfect  law  of  liberty,  nor  hold  up  to  his  own  view,  and 
the  view  of  others,  the  examples  in  the  New  Testament. 
To  use  one  of  his  owm  illustrations,  applied  in  conversation 
to  another  subject,  his  piety  did  not  rise  high  enough  to 
keep  the  sharp  and  rugged  prominences  of  truth,  which 
reason  cannot  scale  with  safety,  beneath  the  surface ;  be- 
cause his  own  experience  was  not  deeper,  they  rose,  or 
were  suffered  to  rise,  into  occasions  of  mischief  and  diffi- 
culty. Had  the  powerful  spring-tide  of  piety  as  well  as 
mind  overflowed  his  being,  there  would  have  been  no 
breakers  in  the  sea.  Had  Foster's  mind  been  lifted,  for 
example,  to  a  post  of  observation  like  that  of  Edwards, 
when  he  wrote  the  history  of  Human  Redemption,  what  a 
very  different  view  he  would  have  taken  of  the  economy 
of  human  existence  with  its  lurid  shades.  He  has  such  a 
post  now,  we  doubt  not,  amidst  the  "  sanctities  of  heaven." 

The   truth  of  eternal  retribution  is  a  citadel  defended 


336  LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

by  many  batteries.  So  fast  as  to  the  vision  of  an  enemy 
one  seems  to  be  demolished,  another  rises.  In  the  Scrip- 
tures, in  human  reason,  from  analogy,  from  the  nature  of 
things,  from  the  character  of  God,  from  the  character  of 
man,  the  evidence  is  solemn  and  overwhelming.  You  may 
play  your  game  of  escape,  if  the  laws  of  evidence  be  dis- 
regarded, but  with  one  who  holds  you  to  logical  conclasions, 
in  every  possible  move  you  are  check-mated.  You  cannot 
put  the  various  doctrines  of  the  Bible  in  any  relative  array 
but  they  lead  to  this ;  yon  cannot  exclude  this  from  any 
possible  combination.  And  any  one  of  the  elements  of  the 
Scriptural  problem  given,  may  lead  you  through  the  whole 
circle  of  Truth.  Given,  the  atonement ;  to  find  the  cha- 
racter of  man,  and  its  relation  to  the  element  of  retribu- 
tion ; — that  would  do  it.  Or,  given,  the  character  of  man 
and  the  character  of  God ;  to  find  the  element  of  retribu- 
tion ;  that  would  do  it.  Or,  given,  the  necessity  of  Divine 
grace  to  fit  the  soul  for  heaven,  the  atonement  being  the 
sole  condition  of  that  grace  ;  to  find  the  element  of  retribu- 
tion; that  would  do  it.  Or,  given,  the  existence  and 
agency  of  fallen  spirits  to  find  man's  retribution ;  that 
would  do  it.  Or,  given,  the  bare  offer  of  eternal  life  ;  that 
would  do  it.  Or,  given,  the  benevolence  of  God,  the  axiom 
of  the  universe,  God  is  Love  ;  that  would  do  it.  For  all 
retribution  is  invested  with  the  atmosphere  of  love,  and 
had  not  God  been  Love,  he  might  have  let  the  guilty  go 
unpunished.  But  Justice  only  does  the  work  of  love,  and 
Love  works  by  Justice  for  the  purity  and  blessedness  of  the 
universe.  Where  there  is  sin,  love  without  wrath,  with- 
out retribution,  would  only  be  connivance  with  iniquity. 
There  is  no  such  thing  as  love  without  justice,  or  justice 
without  penalty,  or  penalty  without  execution,  or  execu- 
tion ivith  end,  so  long  as  there  is  sin. 

Even  in  our  natural  theology,  sin  being  given,  pain  is  abso- 
lutely necessary  in  order  to  prove  the  benevolence  of  God. 
So  that  the  problem  and  the  answer  might  be  stated  thus : 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  337 

Given,  the  fact  of  sin,  how  will  you  demonstrate  that  God 
is  a  good  being  ?  Answer :  Only  by  {woving  that  God 
punishes  sin.  In  this  view,  the  actual  degree  of  misery 
with  which  earth  is  filled,  so  far  from  being  a  difficulty  in 
God's  government,  goes  to  establish  it  as  God's.  A  male- 
volent being  would  have  let  men  sin,  without  making  them 
miserable ;  therefore,  God  could  not  be  proved  benevolent, 
unless,  in  a  world  of  sin,  there  were  the  ingredient  of 
misery. 

But  the  arrangement  in  this  world  is  imperfect,  even  to 
a  pagan  mind,  and  leaves  the  system  open  to  doubt  as  to 
God's  justice,  because  sin  is  so  often  without  punishment, 
and  the  wicked  escape.  But  if  they  escape  here  only  to  meet 
a  perfect  retribution  hereafter,  the  doubt  is  removed.  Here, 
then,  in  this  world,  wq  see  only  the  seeds,  the  roots,  the  im- 
perfect development  of  a  system,  v/hich  has  its  perfection  in 
the  eternal  world.  Such  is  the  inevitable  argument  from  our 
natural  theology.  A  mind  like  Bishop  Butler's,  not  with- 
held, as  Foster's  was,  by  permitted  doubts  as  to  the  Divine 
goodness,  from  pressing  the  argument  to  its  logical  conclu- 
sion, finds  in  the  eternal  world  the  completion  of  the  sys- 
tem, which  is  but  begun  in  this.  Then  th«re  comes  in 
revelation,  to  bring  the  prophecy  of  our  natural  theology  to 
an  absolute  certainty,  detailing  beforehand  the  perfect  pro- 
visions of  the  Divine  government,  and  showing  that  the 
partial  Rdishes  of  justice  in  this  world  are  but  the  restraint 
of  the  Divine  indignation,  under  a  system  of  mercy  through 
the  death  of  the  Son  of  God ;  so  that  while  there  are 
intimations  enough  of  retributive  justice  to  warn  men  of 
what  is  to  come,  if  they  do  not  avail  themselves  of  that 
mercy  ;  there  is  restraint  enough  of  retributive  justice  to 
constitute  a  perfect  probation,  and  leave  unembarrassed 
the  entire  free  agency  of  man.  There  is  retribution  enough 
to  show  that  God  can  and  will  punish  sin ;  retribution  so 
little,  as  to  show  that  what  he  does  not  do  here,  he  will 
do  hereafter.  ^.  ... 

15 


338  LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

In  such  a  system,  the  very  provisions  of  mercy  arc 
manifestly  an  overwhehning  proof  that  there  can  be  mercy 
in  no  other  way.  The  provisions  of  mercy,  if  rejecl:ed, 
return  into  sanctions  of  the  law,  and  are  the  greatest  as- 
surances of  an  endless  retribution.  Just  thus  is  the  argu- 
ment conducted  in  the  Scriptures.  And  it  must  be  a  most 
singular  perversity  of  mind,  that,  accepting  humbly  of  those 
provisions  for  itself,  as  the  only  possible  way  of  salvation, 
at  the  same  time  condemns  the  goodness  of  God  in  not 
saving  without  those  provisions,  the  persons  who  reject 
them.  It  is  turning  the  whole  foundations  of  argument 
upside  down,  and  putting  things  in  the  very  reverse  order 
from  that  which  they  occupy  in  the  Scriptures.  It  is  this 
reverse  order  which  Mr.  Foster  takes.  Given,  justification 
by  faith  alone  ;  to  save  that  part  of  the  world  which  con- 
tinues rebellious,  without  faith.  Or,  in  other  words,  given, 
the  atonement  for  believers  ;  to  save  unbelievers  in  spite 
of  it. 

There  is  no  shadow  of  such  a  problem  presented  for  solu- 
tion in  the  Word  of  God.  The  question  is  not  even 
mooted  of  the  possibiliti;  of  such  salvation.  If  there  be 
any  form  of  question  about  it,  it  is  presented  in  such  a 
shape,  as  to  constitute  a  new  and  more  impregnable  variety 
in  the  argument  of  retribution ;  not,  how  can  they  be 
saved?  but,  how  can  they  escape^  who  neg-lect  so  great 
salvation  ?  Given  by  God's  mercy,  the  atonement ;  what 
MUST  become  of  those  who  reject  it  ?  That  is  the  solemn 
path,  into  which  our  inquisitive  thoughts  are  turned  in  the 
Scripture. 

There  is  a  marked  contradiction  between  Mr.  Foster's 
line  of  reasoning  on  this  subject,  and  his  practical  solemnity 
and  power  in  the  enforcement  of  repentance.  Take,  for 
example,  those  admirable  letters  written  to  assist  a  soul  on 
the  verge  of  the  eternal  world  in  its  preparation  for  the 
change  from  this  world  to  that.  He  never  glances  at  a 
possibility  of  there  being   safety  in  the  eternal  world,  with- 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  339 

out  a  previous  reliance  upon  Christ  in  this.  His  whole  ar- 
gument, in  all  the  solemnity  which  Foster,  of  all  men,  pos- 
sessed a  surpassing  ability  to  throw  around  it,  so  that  it 
seems  as  a  dark  cloud  coming  to  brood  over  the  spirit  with 
mutterings  of  thunder,  is  constructed  here  and  elsewhere 
on  the  impossibility  of  blessedness  in  heaven  without  re- 
generation by  Divine  grace  ;  the  impossibility  of  that  grace, 
except  on  a  personal  application  to,  and  reliance  upon,  the 
Divine  Mediator ;  the  impossibility  of  guilt  being  taken 
away  but  by  relying  wholly  on  the  Saviour  of  the  world; 
the  impossibility  of  pardon,  without  seeking  pardon  through 
his  blood.  To  all  this  he  adds  the  inveteracy  and  profound- 
ness of  human  depravity,  the  utterly  perverted  state  of 
every  heart.  "It  is  here^''  says  he,  speaking  to  a  dear 
and  most  amiable  young  friend,  "  that  we  need  pardoning 
mercy  to  remove  the  guilt,  and  the  operations  of  the  Divine 
Spirit  to  transform  our  nature  and  reverse  its  tendencies. 
It  is  thus  alone  that  we  can  be  made  fit  for  the  community 
and  felicity  of  heaven."  And  to  all  this  he  is  wont  to  add 
the  emphatic  pressure  of  the  danger  of  delay,  lest  the  op- 
portunity be  passed  by,  and  the  immortal  spirit  be  •'  driven 
away  in  its  wickedness,"  unprepared  to  meet  its  Judge. 

What  is  there  behind  all  this  ?  What  does  it  indicate  ? 
A  deep,  unfathomable  conviction  of  the  danger  of  eternal 
retribution,  a  conviction  which  sinks  Foster's  sentences 
into  the  conscience  as  with  the  pen  of  a  diamond ;  a  con- 
viction which  goes  beforehand  with  the  reader,  and  prepares 
the  mind  to  receive  the  impression  from  Foster's  solemnity 
of  appeal,  stamped  as  with  the  weight  of  a  mountain.  The 
conviction  in  Foster's  mind  was  indeed  habitually  wrestling 
with  doubt ;  but  whenever  he  addressed  himself  to  the  work 
of  warning  an  immortal  being,  the  instinctive  energy  of  the 
conviction,  quickened  by  anxiety  for  another,  seemed  to 
thrust  the  doubt  down,  and  the  tide  of  solemn  thought 
pressed  unimpeded  onward.  Such  declarations  of  Foster's 
belief  as  this,  that  it  is  only  by  the   Scriptural  view  of  the 


340  LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

Mediator  that  "  all  our  guilt  can  be  removed  from  the  soul, 
and  dissevered  from  its  destiny  in  the  life  to  come,''''  indi- 
cate a  reef  of  thought  on  this  subject,  over  which  the  anxi- 
eties of  his  mind  were  thundering  incessantly.  The  student 
in  theology,  or  young  minister  to  whom  he  addressed  a  let- 
ter so  palpably  inconsistent  with  the  practical  tenor  of  his 
writings,  might  have  answered  him  with  the  question. 
What  mean  the  breakers  on  that  reef?  What  is  that 
destiny  in  the  life  to  come,  from  which  guilt  cannot  be 
dissevered  ? 

And  he  may  be  answered  now,  in  Foster's  own  language, 
taken  from  his  earlier  work  on  the  Importance  of  Religion, 
with  a  positive  answer  in  the  shape  of  a  returning  question : 
"The  question  comes  to  you,  whether  you  can  deliberately 
judge  it  better  to  carry  forward  a  corrupt  nature,  uncor- 
rected, untransformed,  unreclaimed  to  God,  into  the  future 
state,  WHERE  IT  MUST  BE  MISERABLE,  than  to  uudcrgo  what- 
ever severity  is  indispensable  in  the  process  of  true  religion, 
which  would  prepare  you  for  a  happy  eternity.  Reflect 
that  you  are  every  day  practically  answering  the  question. 
Can  it  be  that  you  are  answering  it  in  the  affirmative  ?  Do 
I  really  see  before  me  the  rational  being  who  in  effect  avows  : 
— I  cannot,  will  not,  submit  to  such  a  discipline,  though  in 
refusing  it  and  resisting  it,  I  renounce  an  infinite  and  eternal 
good,  and  consign  myself  to  perdition  ?" 

He  may  be  answered  with  another  sentence,  taken  from 
the  same  powerful  work  of  Mr.  Foster,  and  applied  by  Fos- 
ter himself,  as  the  final  answer  to  those  who  question  the 
truth  of  that  "  appalling  estimate  of  future  ruin,"  presented 
by  the  evangelical  religious  doctrine  : — an  answer  which 
the  writer  himself  would  have  done  well  to  put  up  in  char- 
acters of  fire  over  his  own  entrance  to  the  consideration  of 
the  subject : — "  We  have  only  to  reply,  that,  as  he  has  not 
yet  seen  the  world  of  retribution,  he  is  to  take  his  estimate 
OF  its  awards  from  the  declaration  of  Him,  who  knows 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  341 

WHAT  THEY  ARE,  AND  THAT  IT  IS  AT  HIS  PERIL  HE  ASSUMES  TO 


ENTERTAIN  ANY  OTHER." 


Here  we  rest.  This  single  sentence  contains  a  wisdom 
that  quite  sets  aside  Mr.  Foster's  whole  letter  on  the  sub- 
ject of  Divine  Penalty.  God  only  knows  the  retributions 
of  eternity,  and  it  is  at  our  peril  that  we  assume  to  enter- 
tain any  other  estimate  of  them,  than  that  which  his  words 
distinctly  reveal. 

We  cannot  better  close  our  notices  of  this  subject,  and 
of  these  intensely  interesting  volumes,  than  by  quoting 
two  of  the  remarks  in  Mr.  Foster's  Journal,  numbered  321 
and  323. 

"  We  are,  as  to  the  grand  system  and  series  of  God's  government,  like  a 
man  who,  confined  in  a  dark  room,  should  observe  through  a  chink  in  the 
wall,  some  large  animal  pacing  by: — he  sees  but  an  extremely  small  strip  of 
the  animal  at  once  as  it  passes  by,  and  is  utterly  unable  to  form  an  idea  of 
the  size,  proportions,  or  shape  of  it." 

"  How  dangerous  to  defer  those  momentous  reformations  which  conscience 
is  solemnly  preaching  to  the  heart.  If  they  are  neglected,  the  difficulty  and 
indisposition  are  increasing  ever}'^  month.  The  mind  is  receding,  degree  after 
degree,  from  the  warm  and  hopeful  zone,  till  at  last  it  will  enter  the  arctic 
circle,  and  become  fixed  in  relentless  and  eternal  ice." 

Out  of  the  first  three  hundred  articles  in  this  Journal, 
prepared  with  great  care  by  Mr.  Foster's  own  hand,  only 
twenty-eight  have  been  published  ;  of  the  others,  likewise, 
many  are  omitted.  We  cannot  conceive  the  reason  for  this 
procedure.  It  would  seem  proper  to  have  published  the 
whole  of  the  Journal ;  it  will  be  strange  indeed,  if  it  be  not 
demanded  by  the  earnest  desire  to  know  all  that  can  be 
known  of  the  mental  and  spiritual  processes  of  so  remark- 
able a  mind.  Appended  to  these  volumes  are  some  deeply 
interesting  notices  of  Mr.  Foster,  as  a  preacher  and  com- 
panion, by  John  Sheppard,  author  of  Thoughts  on  Devotion, 
and  other  productions. 

We  have  spoken  of  that  delightful  trait  in  Mr.  Foster's 
noble  nature, — his  childlike  ingenuousness.  There  was  in 
him  a  striking  combination  of  simplicity  of  purpose,  inde- 


342  LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

pendence,  originality,  and  fearlessness  of  human  opinion. 
Now  if  he  had  possessed,  along  with  these  qualities,  a  greater 
degree  of  wisdom  in  practical  judgment,  we  believe  we 
should  have  seen  in  the  memorials  of  his  biography  more  of 
positive  faith,  and  less  of  the  workings  of  anxious  disquiet- 
ing, and  sometimes  agonizing  doubt.  There  are  seasons  of 
doubt  and  darkness  in  Christian  experience,  which  man 
should  keep  from  man,  and  carry  only  to  God.  He  should 
keep  them,  not  because  he  fears  the  tribunal  of  human 
opinion,  but  fears  to  add  what  may  be  the  wrongfulness  of 
his  own  state  of  mind  to  the  sum  of  error  and  unbelief  in 
the  world.  He  should  cease  from  man,  and  wait  patiently 
upon  God  for  light,  because  he  loves  his  fellow  beings,  and 
is  unwilling  by  his  own  uncertainties,  which  may  spring 
from  he  knows  not  how  many  evil  influences,  to  run  the 
hazard  of  balancing  their  uncertainty  on  the  wrong  side. 
It  is  no  part  of  a  childlike  ingenuousness  to  giv3  utterance 
always  to  whatever  may  perplex  the  soul  in  its  conflicts 
with  the  powers  of  darkness. 

The  admirable  constitution  of  the  mind  of  Robert  Hall 
in  reference  to  this  subject  has  been  developed  by  Mr.  Foster 
himself  in  his  own  original  and  forcible  style.  In  that  part 
of  his  remarks  on  Mr.  Hall's  character  as  a  preacher,  ho 
has  alluded  to  the  peculiar  tendency  in  some  minds  to  brood 
over  the  shaded  frontier  of  awful  darkness  on  the  borders  of 
our  field  of  knowledge.  "  There  are  certain  mysterious 
phenomena,"  says  he,  "  in  the  moral  economy  of  our  world, 
which  compel,  and  will  not  release,  the  attention  of  a 
thoughtful  mind,  especially  if  of  a  gloomy  constitutional 
tendency.  Wherever  it  turns,  it  still  encounters  their  por- 
tentous aspect ;  often  feels  arrested  and  fixed  by  them  as 
under  some  potent  spell ;  making  an  effort,  still  renewed, 
and  still  unavailing,  to  escape  from  the  appalling  presence 
of  the  vision."  Mr.  Foster  is  here  evidently  disclosing 
something  of  the  habit  of  his  own  experience.  He  was 
longing  to  have  the  oppression  upon  his  mind  alleviated  ; 


LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER.  343 

and  he  thought  that  the  strenuous  deliberate  exertion  of  a 
power  of  thought  like  Mr.  Hall's,  after  he  had  been  so  deeply- 
conversant  with  important  and  difficult  speculations,  might 
perhaps  have  contributed  something  towards  such  an  allevia- 
tion. But  even  Mr.  Hall  could  have  effected  nothing  of 
this  nature  for  a  mind  which  would  not  exercise  a  childlike 
faith.  Carry  our  knowledge  up  to  the  last  point  to  which 
the  strongest  mind  ever  created  could  advance  it,  and  there 
is  still  the  same  need  of  faith, — contented,  quiet,  submissive 
faith.  And  how  is  faith  ever  to  be  tried,  how  can  it  be 
proved  that  it  is  the  faith  of  an  humble  and  submissive 
mind,  except  in  the  midst,  or  on  the  border  of  great  diffi- 
culties ? 

Mr.  Foster  speaks,  almost  with  a  feeling  of  disappoint- 
ment, of  that  peculiarity  in  Mr.  Hall's  mental  character,  by 
which  he  appeared  *'  disinclined  to  pursue  any  inquiries  be- 
yond the  point  where  substantial  evidence  fails.  He  seemed 
content  to  let  it  remain  a  terra  incognita,  till  the  hour  that 
puts  an  end  to  conjecture."  We  confess  we  see  a  deep 
wisdom  and  beauty  in  this  trait  of  character.  It  was 
wrought  into  Mr.  Hall's  constitution  not  by  nature  only, 
but  by  the  power  of  grace  divine.  And  the  more  the  soul 
is  absorbed  with  the  known  realities  of  our  being,  and  the 
overwhelming  importance  of  what  is  clearly  revealed  of  our 
destiny  in  the  world  to  come,  the  more  anxious  it  will  be  to 
press  that  knowledge,  the  more  unwilling  to  distract  the 
attention  from  it  by  the  pursuit  of  doubt  and  inquisitive 
speculation,  and  the  more  content  to  leave  the  obscure  and 
the  mysterious  to  the  hour  when  we  shall  see  as  we  are 
seen,  and  know  as  we  are  known.  "  My  efforts,"  said  Mr. 
Foster,  in  his  journal,  "  to  enter  into  possession  of  the  vast 
world  of  moral  and  metaphysical  truth,  are  like  those  of  a 
mouse  attempting  to  gnaw  through  the  door  of  a  granary." 
It  was  also  a  curious  remark  which  he  made,  that  "  one 
object  of  life  should  be  to  accumulate  a  great  number  of 
grand  questions  to  be  asked  and  resolved  in  eternity."     In- 


344  LIFE    AND    WRITINGS    OF    JOHN    FOSTER. 

quisitive  wonderer  in  the  presence  of  mysterious  and  incom- 
prehensible truth !  Art  thou  now  in  a  world,  where  faith 
is  no  longer  needed  ?  Or  do  the  answers  that  in  the  light 
of  eternity,  the  light  of  Heaven,  have  burst  upon  thy  re- 
deemed spirit,  only  render  necessary  a  still  higher  faith,  and 
prepare  thee  for  its  undoubting,  beatific,  everlasting  ex- 
ercise ? 


THE   RELIGION   OF   EXPERIENCE, 

AND    THAT    OF    IMITATIOI^* 


We  have  happened  upon  an  age,  in  which  there  is  a 
great  resurrection  and  life  of  old,  dead,  exploded  errors. 
These  errors,  in  this  new  life,  are  beginning  to  stalk  about 
so  proud  and  populous,  that  in  some  quarters  truth  retires 
and  is  hidden,  or  is  even  stricken  down  in  the  streets  and 
churches.  Error  puts  on  the  semblance  of  truth,  and  re- 
ligion itself,  in  a  form  of  mere  earthly  aggrandizement, 
becomes  one  enormous,  despotic,  consolidated  lie. 

The  difference  between  the  religion  of  experience  and 
that  of  imitation,  is  a  theme  which  at  this  crisis  is  occupy- 
ing many  minds ; — nor  is  this  wonderful,  for  it  is  all  the 
difference  between  a  missionary  piety,  and  a  piety  of  pride, 
intolerance,  and  self-indulgence.  In  the  introduction  of 
our  subject,  we  shall,  in  few  words,  designate  the  two. 

The  world  is  to  be  saved,  if  saved  at  all,  by  the  religion 
of  Experience,  and  not  that  of  Imitation.  The  religion 
of  imitation  is  that  of  forms ;  the  religion  of  experience  is 
that  of  realities.  The  religion  of  imitation  is  Church- 
ianity ;  the  religion  of  experience  is  Christianity.  The- 
religion  of  imitation,  except  when  it  oppresses,  is  that  of 
profound  quiet  and  weakness ;  the  religion  of  experience 
is  that  of  conflict  and  power. 

*  An  Address  delivered  before  the  Society  of  Inquiry  on  Missions,  in 
Amherst  College,  August,  1843. 

15* 


346  THE    RELIGION    OF    EXPERIENCE, 

Imitation  will  do  for  calm  times,  and  gorgeous  forms 
and  rites,  and  magnificent  cathedrals ;  but  experience  is 
needed  in  the  midst  of  danger,  in  dens  and  caves  of  the 
earth,  or  to  support  the  bare  simplicity  of  the  gospel.  Im- 
itation may  be  a  persecuting  religion,  experience  alone  can 
be  a  suffering  one.  Imitation  goes  to  books,  schools,  forms, 
names,  institutes  ;  experience  to  God.  Imitation  takes 
Anselm,  Bernard,  Calvin,  Edwards,  Brainard,  Emmons, 
anything,  everything,  but  God's  word.  Experience  goes 
to  the  living  truth,  and  drinks  into  it.  Imitation  has  the 
semblance  of  experience,  but  not  its  essence  or  its  power. 
Imitation  takes  at  second-hand  what  experience  originates. 
Imitation  studies  systems,  and  reads  the  Bible  to  prove 
them.  Experience  studies  the  Bible,  and  reads  human 
systems  for  illustration.  Imitation  is  not  a  missionary 
spirit ;  experience  is.  Imitation  may  fill  the  world  with 
the  forms  of  piety,  and  with  most  of  its  refining  influences. 
You  may  bring  men  away,  in  great  measure,  from  their 
vices,  and  you  may  refine  their  manners,  and  yet  bring 
them  no  nearer  to  Christ.  And  hei-e  I  am  constrained  to 
remark,  that  one  of  our  greatest  dangers  in  the  missionary 
enterprise  lies  in  the  fact,  that  so  much,  in  reality,  may  be 
done  without  the  religion  of  experience,  the  co-operation  of 
the  Holy  Spirit.  The  world  might  be  filled  with  a  nominal 
Christianity,  yea,  an  evangelical  Christianity,  and  the 
Spirit  of  God  have  very  little  to  do  with  it.  There  might 
be  all  the  ameliorating  influences  of  Christianity,  except 
that  of  real  conversion,  following  in  the  train  of  our  efforts 
in  every  part  of  the  world,  and  even  the  instrumentality  of 
a  prayerless  church  might  be  suflicient  for  such  an  evan- 
gelization. The  dome  of  some  gorgeous  and  heartless 
establishment,  with  all  its  decency  and  refinement,  might 
be  let  down  to  cover  every  form  of  idolatry  and  heathenism, 
and  to  bring  all  tribes  and  communities  of  the  gentile  world 
in  obedience  to  its  rubrics  and  beneath  its  power.  But 
what  then  would  be  gained  ?     Why,  this  spiritual  quack- 


AND    THAT    OF    IMITATION.  347 

ery  on  a  vast  scale,  this  healing  of  the  world's  hurts 
slightly,  would  only  put  off  to  a  more  distant  period  the 
real  prevalence  of  Christ's  kingdom,  and  render  a  thousand 
times  more  difficult  the  real  redemption  of  mankind  from 
sin. 

Now,  it  is  to  be  feared  that  the  religious  characteristic 
of  this  age,  compared  with  some  other  ages,  is  that  of  im- 
itation rather  than  experience.  This,  in  some  respects,  is 
the  natural  course  of  things.  It  is  so,  intellectually.  An 
age  of  eminently  original  genius  is  ordinarily  succeeded  by 
an  imitative  age  ;  or,  if  not  imitative,  the  contrast  between 
the  splendor  of  genius,  and  the  poverty  of  mere  talent, 
makes  it  appear  such.  For  example,  the  Elizabethian  age 
in  England,  the  age  of  Shakspeare,  Milton,  and  Bacon, 
was  an  age  of  originality  and  power  ;  the  age  of  Queen 
Anne  afterwards  was  an  age  of  comparative  imitation  and 
weakness.  These  two  ages,  or  something  near  them,  may 
also  be  taken  as  corresponding  examples  of  the  religion  of 
experience  and  that  of  imitation.  The  presence  and 
agency  of  God's  Spirit,  and  the  power  of  God's  Word, 
marked  the  one  ;  that  of  human  morality,  speculation,  and 
understanding,  the  other.  Bunyan  and  Baxter,  and  we 
may  add  Leighton,  may  stand  to  personify  the  one ;  Til- 
lotson  and  Locke  may  be  the  interpreters  of  the  other. 
The  seventeenth  century,  both  in  literature  and  religion, 
may,  in  a  general  comparison  with  our  century,  be  said  to 
stand  in  the  contrast  of  an  age  of  experience  with  an  age 
of  imitation. 

For  this  inferiority  of  one  age  to  another,  there  may  be 
natural  inevitable  causes  in  respect  to  the  development  of 
mind  and  genius,  but  in  religious  things  we  are  sure  it 
ought  not  to  be  so.  An  age  of  religious  imitation  marks  a 
period  of  departure  from  God  ;  this  is  undeniable.  An 
age  cannot  be  destitute  of  deep  and  original  religious  expe- 
rience, if  it  enjoy  the  word  of  God,  and  the  ordinances  of 
religion,  without  a  great  falling  off  from  duty,  and  a  great 


348  THE    RELIGION    OF    EXPERIENCE, 

betrayal  of  its  own  interests.  Yet  it  is  to  be  feared,  all 
thing*  taken  together,  that  the  religion  of  this  age  is  a 
religion  of  imitation  rather  than  experience  ;  a  religion,  the 
character  of  which,  on  the  whole,  is  superficiality  rather 
than  profound  originality  and  power.  Into  this  prevailing 
habitude  every  individual  new-comer  is  baptized  ;  every 
religionist  grows  up  in  this  atmosphere  ;  forms  his  habits, 
active  and  passive,  meditative  and  operative,  inward  and 
external,  beneath  it.  The  form  of  piety  in  the  New  Tes- 
tament is  not  the  object  of  general  vision,  but  the  form  of 
piety  in  the  Church  ;  and  through  this  medium  the  charac- 
teristics of  the  gospel  are  seen  as  through  an  obscuring 
haze,  and  not  in  their  own  clear,  definite,  celestial  shape. 
It  is  as  if  we  should  contemplate  the  heavens,  and  study 
astronomy,  in  the  reflection  thrown  into  the  bosom  of  a 
mountain  lake.  Indeed,  if  the  lake  be  clear  and  pellucid, 
seen  in  a  still  night,  you  may  read  the  heavens  therein  ; 
but  if  the  wind  ruffle  its  surface  ever  so  little,  or  if  any 
impurity  obscure  the  crystal  clearness  of  its  waters,  you 
can  never  have  the  image  of  truth.  The  stars  will  seem 
double  and  dim,  the  planets  will  twinkle  and  lose  their 
lustre,  and  you  would  not  give  much  for  the  best  astronom- 
ical system  that  ages  of  investigation  could  produce  from 
such  a  study.  So  we  contemplate  the  forms  of  religion, 
not  in  their  native  brightness,  but  in  the  obscurity  of  men's 
lives,  in  a  dim,  turbid  reflection,  in  the  troubled  waters  of  a 
worldly  piety.  And  this  is  just  the  error  against  which 
the  Apostle  warns  us  by  the  example  of  those,  who, 
'*  measuring  themselves  by  themselves,  and  comparing 
themselves  among  themselves,  are  not  wise."  However 
pure  may  be  the  medium,  if  we  have  come  into  the  habit 
of  looking  at  the  piety  of  the  gospel  through  it,  or  rather  at 
the  reflection  of  the  gospel  in  it,  we  soon  lose  the  sense  of 
its  native  power  and  glory. 

Now  all  this  produces  a  puny,  sickly,  stunted,  dwarf- 
like, superstitious  piety,  instead  of  the  free,  noble,  healthful, 


AND    THAT    OF    IMITATION. 


S4^ 


manly  growth  of  the  Scriptures.  Instead  of  a  piety  that 
mounts  up  on  wings  as  eagles,  those  wings  are  clipped,  and 
the  bird  that  should  have  soared  even  above  the  lightnings 
of  the  tempest  into  the  pure  empyrean,  beats  and  soils  its 
plumes  against  the  bars  of  its  prison.  We  know  not  if 
this  age  will  ever  awake  to  a  sense  of  its  departure  from 
God,  and  of  the  degraded  and  imprisoned  state  of  its  piety; 
but  we  are  perfectly  sure  that  this  soiled,  craven,  doubting, 
plodding,  care-worn,  self-seeking  form,  in  which  religion 
goes  about  in  our  churches,  is  not  the  open,  noble,  trusting, 
singing,  independent,  angelic,  self-forgetting  creature  of  the 
Scriptures.  "  These  things,"  said  our  blessed  Saviour  to 
his  disciples,  ''  have  I  spoken  unto  you,  that  my  joy  might 
remain  in  you,  and  that  your  joy  might  be  full."  We 
stand  in  amazement  before  the  open  door  of  heaven  revealed 
in  these  w^ords  by  the  Saviour  to  his  people.  There  is  a 
glory  and  a  power,  a  beauty  (md  a  depth  of  blessedness  in 
them,  that  we  never  see  realized.  And  yet  this  is  but  one 
description  of  the  piety  of  the  New  Testament ;  this  is  the 
angelic  form  of  that  religion  which  the  Apostles  believed 
was  to  fill  the  world.  This  experience  of  Christ's  own  joy 
is  the  legitimate  product  of  Christ's  own  word  in  its  native 
power  and  glory.  And  truly,  if  all  believers  possessed  this 
experience,  and  lived  by  it  and  upon  it,  the  radiancy  of 
such  piety  loould  fill  the  world.  This,  we  say,  is  the 
power  of  God's  word  ;  this  is  its  essential  nature.  If  we 
do  but  note  its  elements  in  the  most  careless  manner,  we 
shall  find  this  to  be  the  case.  They  are  such,  that  no  man 
can  bring  his  soul  under  the  power  of  them,  and  not  expe- 
rience this  disenthralment  and  transfiguration  of  his  being. 
Never  did  our  Saviour  mean  that  his  joy  should  remain  in 
his  disciples  in  any  other  way,  than  by  the  words  which 
he  spake  unto  them,  and  would  still  speak,  remaining  in 
them.  And  this,  indeed,  is  what  he  said :  "if  ye  abide  in 
me,  and  my  words  abide  in  you,  ye  shall  ask  what  ye  will, 
and  it  shall  be  done  unto  you."     And  this  was  to  be  the 


350  THE    RELIGION    OF    EXPERIENCE, 

office  of  the  Holy  Ghost,  the  Comforter,  to  "  teach  you  all 
things,  and  bring  all  things  to  your  remembrance,  whatso- 
ever I  have  said  unto  you."  We  say  again,  this  is  the 
power  of  God's  word,  and  this  is  the  religion  of  experience; 
but  it  is  not  the  power  of  God's  word  with  a  soul  which  is 
not  kept  under  it.  It  is  the  power  of  God's  word,  when 
its  living  truths  are  believed  and  realized  ;  and  these  truths 
are  of  such  a  nature,  that  it  is  not  possible  it  should  be 
otherwise. 

I.  Now,  in  dwelling  upon  some  of  the  causes  which  have 
tended  to  make  the  piety  of  this  age  an  imitative  piety, 
rather  than  a  piety  of  experience  and  originality ;  and 
therefore  a  self-indulgent,  rather  than  a  missionary  piety ; 
we  shall  begin  with  the  mention  of  this  great  evil,  namely, 
the  want  of  a  vivid,  abiding  perception  of,  and  a  meditative 
pondering  upon,  the  individual  truths  of  the  Scriptures.  It 
is  not  the  habit  of  this  age  to  live  in  and  upon  God's  word  ; 
though  at  the  same  time  this  age  knows  more  about  the 
word  of  God,  than  any  preceding  age.  Hence  results  in- 
ward weakness,  even  amidst  great  apparent  knowledge. 
Hence,  although  the  form  may  be  perfect,  the  Spirit  in- 
habits it  not.  Hence  an  inertness,  like  that  which  ensues 
on  the  breaking  or  partial  interruption  of  a  galvanic  chain ; 
a  paralysis,  like  that  of  the  limbs,  when  there  happens  a 
disconnection  between  the  spine  and  the  extremities.  What 
we  need  is  a  new  baptism  from  heaven  in  the  faith  which 
appreciates  the  power  of  divine  truth,  and  sees  and  feels  its 
reality.  If  we  had  this  faith,  we  should  be  very  different 
creatures.  Any  one  of  the  great  truths  revealed  in  God's 
word,  distinctly  seen,  and  fully  believed  and  appreciated, 
would  change  the  whole  character.  It  would  possess  the 
mind  and  enlist  all  the  faculties.  It  would  lift  up  the  soul 
from  the  atmosphere  of  earth,  to  the  atmosphere  of  heaven. 
Baptized  into  its  power  as  a  spiritual  element,  it  would 
make  us  superior  alike  to  the  fear  of  man,  and  the  allure- 
ments of  the  world  ;  insensible  to   fatigue,  and   ready  for 


AND    THAT    OF    IMITATION.  351 

perpetual  effort.  It  would  be  received  into  our  spiritual 
existence,  a  powerful,  practical  life,  and  not  a  mere  barren 
speculation. 

A  belief  of  the  truth  that  hundreds  of  millions  of  our 
fellow-beings  are,  generation  after  generation,  sinking  into 
endless  ruin  ;  and  that  God  has  placed  in  our  hands  the 
means  of  their  salvation  ;  an  appreciation  of  this  truth,  with 
a  spiritual  vividness  and  power  at  all  like  that  which  dwelt 
in  the  soul  of  the  apostles,  would  quite  arrest  and  enchain 
the  mind  beneath  its  influence,  so  that  a  man  would  act 
with  so  much  exhaustless  energy  for  the  redemption  of  his 
fellow-beings  that  the  world  would  well  nigh  deem  him 
mad.  And  such  madness  would  be  true  wisdom.  Just 
so,  a  view  of  the  glory  of  Christ,  the  holiness  of  God,  the 
nature  of  sin,  the  shortness  of  time,  the  nearness  of  eternity, 
would  in  like  manner  govern  and  stamp  the  character,  and 
make  a  man  live  like  a  superior  being.  These  are  the  ele- 
ments of  faith,  of  prayer,  of  love,  of  solemnity,  of  power. 
And  it  is  the  blessed  nature  of  these  principles,  their  divine 
and  indissoluble  harmony  and  oneness,  that  a  profound 
meditation  upon  any  one,  and  a  complete  mastery  of  the 
mind  by  it,  instead  of  disturbing  the  mind's  balance,  or 
diminishing  its  impression  of  the  power  and  majesty  of  the 
others,  does  but  set  the  soul  in  the  centre,  like  an  angel  in 
the  sun,  and  prepares  it  the  better  for  the  influence  of  the 
whole  circle  of  divine  truths.  Men  whose  benevolence  is 
confined  to  one  thing,  and  who  give  to  that  an  absorbing 
predominance,  are  sometimes  designated  as  men  of  one 
idea.  It  were  to  be  wished  that  the  world  were  full  of 
Christians  with  one  idea.  The  cross  of  Christ  is  an  idea. 
It  is  the  idea  which  possessed  and  governed  the  lives  of  the 
Apostles.  It  is  the  idea  that  ought  to  rule  the  world.  When 
an  earthly  idea  masters  the  mind,  to  the  exclusion  of  every 
other,  it  produces  insanity.  In  regard  to  heavenly  things, 
such  madness  is  wise.  Oh  that  we  were  all  thus  mad  ! 
When  one  of  the  elementary  truths  of  the  gospel  thus  mas- 


352  THE    RELIGION    OF    EXPERIENCE, 

ters  the  mindj  it  quite  transfigures  it  with  power  and  glory. 
It  gives  it  the  wings  of  a  seraph,  the  freedom  and  swiftness 
of  a  celestial  nature.  It  darkens  this  world  ;  but  it  is  only 
because  it  lets  in  heaven  upon  the  soul,  and  shows,  along 
with  the  value  of  the  soul,  the  true  insignificance  of  this 
world  and  its  vanities. 

Now,  it  seems  quite  manifest  that  the  ordinary  measure 
of  religion  in  this  age  fails  to  put  the  soul  under  this  expe- 
rience of  the  power  of  God's  word,  this  burning,  life-giving 
experience.  We  repeat  it,  that  we  need  a  new  baptism 
from  heaven,  such  personal,  experimental  knowledge  of  the 
irresistible  energy  and  efficacy  of  divine  truth,  and  such 
inward  love  and  joy  in  its  possession,  as  shall  make  us  feel 
that  this  is  the  only  weapon,  the  only  instrumentality  we 
need,  for  that  it  will  work  in  the  whole  world  as  effectually 
as  it  does  in  ourselves.  It  would  make  a  new  Reformation, 
should  there  be  such  a  baptism.  In  this  view,  we  hail  the 
appearance  of  such  works  as  have  come  to  us  of  late  from 
among  the  mountains  of  Switzerland,  the  proper  place  for 
the  birth  and  reverberation  of  such  a  voice,  the  voice  as  of 
a  kingly  spirit  throned  among  the  hills, — the  work  of  Gaus- 
sen,  on  the  Inspiration  of  God's  word,  and  that  noble  work 
of  D'Aubigne,  on  the  History  of  the  Reformation.  And 
sure  we  are,  that  if,  in  the  spirit  of  reliance  on  God's  word, 
and  with  the  intensity  of  a  living  experience  of  its  individ- 
ual truths,  we  should  go  forth  as  Luther ;  if  the  Christian 
church  should  do  this,  then  would  that  system  of  Antichrist, 
which  has  lived  by  the  hiding,  corruption,  ignorance  and 
inexperience  of  God's  word,  die.  The  spirit  of  Romanism 
would  die  also,  whatever  shape  of  formalism  it  may  inhabit. 
The  new  forms  of  Romanism  would  perish  almost  as  soon 
as  they  should  be  born.  The  idolatry  of  forms  could  no 
more  stand  against  the  fire  of  the  Spirit  of  God's  Word, 
than  the  sere  leaves  and  withered  branches  of  the  woods,  in 
autumn,  could  stand  before  a  forest  conflagration. 

It  cannot  be  denied  that  we  have  been  using  the  word  of 


AND    THAT    OF    IMITATION.  353 

God  rather  as  an  externM  lamp,  than  a7i  imvard  foun- 
tain ;  and  hence  so  much  knowledge  of  duty,  but  so  little 
love  and  performance.  "We  were  very  much  struck  with 
this  remark,  in  that  book  on  inspiration,  to  which  we  have 
referred  ;  for  there  is  nothing  more  certain,  than  that  other 
men's  experience  at  second  hand,  in  divine  things,  is  life- 
less. It  is  not  what  David  Brainard  or  Jonathan  Edwards 
felt,  that  can  constitute  my  power,  but  what  the  Spirit  of 
God  teaches  me,  and  makes  me  feel.  Assuredly  this  is 
the  grand  reason  why  so  much  of  the  piety  of  this  age 
is  ineffectual.  There  are  trees  which  remain  standing 
in  the  midst  of  the  forest,  even  after  they  are  inwardly 
and  completely  rotten,  solely  by  the  strength  and  thickness 
of  their  bark  ;  and  just  so  a  strong  envelop  of  forms,  with 
the  "  odor  of  sanctity"  gathered  from  some  great  names, 
may  keep  the  Christian  and  the  church  in  the  position  of 
life,  long  after  the  spirit  of  life  has  almost  utterly  departed. 
But  no  Christian  can  live  and  be  efficient  by  leaning  on 
anything  external  for  support. 

To  be  powerful  in  religion,  a  Christian  must  be,  in  a 
most  important  sense,  a  self-made  man ;  his  acquisitions 
must  be  original ;  he  can  no  more  gird  himself  with  the 
freshness  and  power  of  a  living  piety  at  second-hand, 
than  a  man  could  wield  the  miraculous  energy  of  Paul 
or  Peter,  by  looking  at  its  exercise.  He  must  have  a 
personal  baptism  from  God's  word.  Its  living  truths,  in 
their  simplicity  and  burning  power,  have  been  darkened 
by  our  speculations  ;  and  even  in  correct  feeling  we  are 
deep  in  the  empty  channels  of  Christian  experience  worn 
by  others,  like  men  travelling  in  the  dry  bed  of  a  mountain 
torrent,  instead  of  being  rapt  onward,  as  in  a  burning 
chariot,  on  the  path,  in  which,  led  and  sustained  by  the 
Spirit  of  God,  it  might  seem  as  if  no  being  ever  travelled 
before  us. 

And  is  the  power  of  God's  word  never  to  be  thus  real- 
ized?    Is  there  never  an  age  coming,  in  which  the  glory 


354  THE    RELIGION    OP    EXPERIENCE, 

of  Christ's  religion  shall  be  demonstrated  ?  Shall  this  re- 
proach never  be  lifted  from  the  Scriptures,  that  they  boast 
a  power,  which  the  world  has  never  seen  exerted  ?  Is  the 
earth  coming  into  its  millennium,  and  is  this  imperfect, 
crude,  lamenting,  uninviting,  world- conforming  piety,  or 
this  superstitious,  domineering,  intolerant  piety  of  forms, 
to  be  all  the  realization  of  righteousness  on  earth  ?  Are 
we  willing,  if  we  will  be  honest,  to  have  the  piety  of  a  re- 
generated world  moulded  by  the  type  of  our  piety  ?  No ! 
we  will  not  believe  that  all  the  rapturous  descriptions  of 
the  Bible  are  thus  to  end  in  smoke ;  we  will  not  subscribe 
to  the  idea  that  such  an  imperfect  Christianity  is  all  that 
we  can  expect  to  spread,  or  to  be  spread  through  the  world, 
or  that  we  must  be  satisfied  never  to  have  a  race,  that 
shall  rise  to  the  stature  of  fall-grown  men  in  Christ  Jesus. 
True  it  is,  that  the  world  has  never  yet  seen  such  a  race, 
or  but  for  a  little.  True  it  is,  that  this  glory  lost  its  lustre 
in  the  obscurity  of  men's  passions,  very  soon  after  the 
death  of  Christ  and  his  apostles,  and  that  generation  after 
generation  has  gone  by,  and  up  to  this  time  no  race  has 
fully  risen  to  the  apostolic  standard.  Nevertheless,  we  may 
remark  that  no  age  was  ever  more  favorably  placed  for  thus 
rising,  than  ours.  It  is  one  of  the  greatest  glories  of  the 
missionary  enterprise,  that  it  promises  to  transfigure  our 
piety,  to  save  it  from  corruption,  and  tt)  raise  it  to  the  im- 
age of  the  same  mind  which  was  in  Christ  Jesus.  It  may 
prove  the  chariots  of  Israel,  and  the  horsemen  thereof,  if 
God's  people  will  but  throw  themselves  into  it. 

II.  The  second  cause  which  we  shall  urge  for  the  im- 
itative cast  of  the  piety  of  this  age,  is  the  prevalence  of 
low  and  indistinct  views  of  Divine  inspiration.  These, 
so  far  as  they  prevail,  are  like  a  tetter  in  the  blood,  or  a 
very  tabes  dorsalis  for  the  corruption  and  weakening  of  the 
vitality  of  our  piety.  The  Apostle  commends  those  who 
receive  the  gospel  as  being  indeed  the  very  word  of  God, 
and  not  as  the  word  of  men.     Now  there  are  many  who, 


AND    THAT    OF    IMITATION.  355 

professing  to  receive  it  as  a  revelation  from  God,  do  never- 
theless receive  it  as  the  word  of  nnen.  The  idea  of  the 
Rationalists  and  the  Unitarians  is  indeed  too  prevalent, 
that  for  us  it  is  not  the  revelation  direct  from  God,  but 
only  the  record  of  that  revelation.  Now  we  had  almost 
said  that  we  would  as  soon  trust  in  the  Koran,  as  in  such 
a  book.  Our  religion  is  built  upon  the  sand,  if  its  support 
be  merely  the  human  record  of  a  divine  revelation.  We 
cannot  take  the  word  of  God  at  second-hand,  any  more 
than,  as  Christians,  we  can  adopt  our  piety  from  others'  ex- 
perience. It  is,  as  we  have  already  intimated,  the  blessed- 
ness of  our  religion,  that  in  everything  we  are  brought  di- 
rectly to  God.  And  so,  as  in  order  to  be  powerful  in  religion 
the  Christian  must  be  perfectly  original  in  his  spiritual  ac- 
quisitions, receiving  them  for  himself  directly  from  the  Spirit 
of  God,  he  must  likewise  feed  upon  the  very  words  of  God, 
and  feel  that  he  is  doing  so.  It  is  no  record  of  a  revela- 
tion that  can  satisfy  him,  or  energize  his  soul,  but  the  reve- 
lation itself;  it  is  no  mere  human  description  of  the  word 
of  God  by  Isaiah  or  Paul,  but  the  word  of  God  itself,  ad- 
dressed to  you  and  me  as  plainly,  as  definitely,  as  verbally, 
as  to  Isaiah  or  Paul.  If  a  man  abandons  this  ground,  he 
abandons  the  citadel  of  his  piety.  He  is  no  longer  original, 
but  imitative,  and  at  second-hand  in  everything.  In  divine 
things,  the  very  nerves  of  his  soul  will  be  cut  in  sunder ; 
and  though  he  may  have  a  religion  that  will  comport  well 
with  peaceable  and  idle  times  and  ceremonies,  yet  in  stormy 
times,  in  convulsions  about  faith,  in  conference  with  infi- 
dels, and  in  personal  conflicts  with  Apollyon,  he  will  find 
himself  weak,  irresolute,  and  defenceless,  with  neither  fixed 
positions,  nor  the  means  of  sustaining  them. 

It  is  one  pestilent  consequence  of  low  views  of  inspira- 
tion, that  philosophy,  falsely  so  called,  is  let  in  to  intermed- 
dle W'ith  the  Scriptures.  A  man  who  cannot  stand  upon 
the  Bible,  as  in  every  part  the  very  word  of  God,  will  not 
and  cannot  have  that  deep,  abiding  faith,  which  is  superior 


356 


THE    RELIGION    OF    EXPERIENCE, 


to  the  vicissitudes  of  merely  human  speculations.  His 
bark  will  be  driven  about  even  in  religious  things,  by  the 
side  winds  of  philosophy  and  science.  He  will  be  ready 
to  submit  a  certain  science  to  an  uncertain ;  he  will  alter 
his  views  of  divine  revelation  in  accordance  with  the  latest 
and  most  approved  geological  theory  ;  and  his  views  of 
divine  doctrine  will  be  modified  by  or  dependent  upon  meta- 
physical reasonings.  For  a  missionary  piety,  the  most  un- 
qualified, unhesitating  reliance  on  the  word  of  God,  is 
absolutely  essential.  In  this  the  Reformers  were  greatly 
superior  to  us.  They  came  out  of  a  church  which  was  all 
error,  and  they  went  direct  to  Christ  and  his  truth,  with  a 
relish  that  made  them  drink  deep  into  it.  We  hesitate  not 
to  say  that  their  views  of  inspiration  were  higher  than  ours. 
They  used  the  Scriptures  inwardly ;  they  took  the  medi- 
cine into  the  soul,  to  be  healed  by  it,  where  we  take  it  into 
the  laboratory  to  analyze  its  ingredients,  and  test  its  purity. 
They  laid  it  away  in  the  heart ;  we  put  it  into  crucibles. 
Their  characteristics  were  those  of  experience  and  wisdom  ; 
ours  are  those  of  knowledge  and  imitation. 

It  must  be  regarded  as  a  special  providence  of  God,  that 
amidst  all  the  despotism  of  Roman  Catholic  error,  amidst 
all  the  concealment  and  ignorance  of  the  Scriptures,  the 
belief  of  mankind  in  their  inspiration  was  preserved  from 
being  undermined  by  such  a  tide  of  Neology  as  hath  since 
swept  over  the  world,  leaving  the  mud  and  spawn  of  infi- 
delity so  universal,  that  it  will  take  time  even  to  cleanse 
it  from  our  most  sacred  things  and  recesses.  Had  that 
tide  come  before  the  birth  of  Luther,  he  would  have  had  but 
very  little  power  over  men's  minds,  in  appealing  to  the 
word  of  God.  If  the  Papacy  had  added  to  all  its  other 
refuges  of  lies,  not  merely  the  withdrawal  of  the  word  of 
God  from  common  perusal,  but  the  denial  of  its  infalli- 
bility, the  instruction  of  the  people  in  a  rationalistic  view 
of  its  inspiration,  a  thousand  Luthers  might  have  appealed 
to  it  in  vain.     And  in  our  day,  if  men  go  forth  to  the  work 


AND    THAT    OF    IMITATION.  357 

of  the  world's  conversion  with  low  and  loose  views  of  the 
inspiration  of  the  Scriptures,  they  will  be  shorn  of  their 
power.  A  man  whose  theory  of  a  divine  inspiration  admits 
the  possibillity  of  error,  the  possibility  that  some  passages 
may  be  less  the  word  of  God  than  others,  and  that  some 
other  passages  may  not  be  the  word  of  God  at  all,  has  no 
firm  ground  to  stand  upon.  "  The  prophet  that  hath  a 
dream,  let  him  tell  a  dream ;  but  he  that  hath  my  word, 
let  him  speak  my  word  faithfully.  What  has  the  chaff  to 
do  with  the  wheat  ?  saith  the  Lord.  Is  not  my  word  like 
as  a  fire,  saith  the  Lord ;  and  like  a  hammer,  that  breaketh 
the  rock  in  pieces  ?" 

III.  The  third  cause,  which  we  shall  allege  for  the  imi- 
tative state  of  our  piety,  is  a  practical  relinquishment  of 
the  principle  that  the  Bible  is  the  only  and  sufficient  rule 
of  faith  and  practice.  There  is  an  evil  of  this  nature  in 
our  age,  double.  There  is  one  party  in  religion  making 
the  church  a  mediator  between  God's  word  and  the  soul. 
Instead  of  Christ's  words,  "  I  am  the  vine  ye  are  the 
branches ;  abide  in  me,  and  let  my  words  abide  in  you  ;" 
their  language  is,  "  The  church  is  the  vine ;  abide  in  the 
church,  and  let  the  words  and  ordinances  of  the  church 
abide  in  you."  This  produces  a  religion  of  dependence  on 
the  church,  and  imitative  on  that  side.  It  is  imitation  of 
the  church,  obedience  to  ceremony  and  tradition,  the  sacri- 
fice of  personal  independence,  not  for  the  sake  of  principle 
but  form ;  it  is  humility  for  the  sake  of  pride,  humility 
not  in  the  shape  of  gentleness  and  love  to  those  beneath  us, 
but  of  the  worship  of  power,  authority,  and  grandeur  above 
us.  This  is  the  humility  which  the  forms  of  a  monarchy 
tend  to  generate,  humility  upwards,  not  downwards ;  the 
minding  of  high  things,  not  the  condescending  to  men  of 
low  estate.  This  is  the  humility  of  Popery,  and  of  that 
form  of  Popery,  which  exists  as  Puseyism  or  High  Church- 
ism.  It  is  humility  to  all  above,  but  pride  and  arrogance 
to  all  beneath.     It  is  self-worship  disguised,  this  professed 


358  THE    RELIGION    OF    EXPERIENCE,  ** 

absorption  into  the  church;  it  is  self-enlarged,  and  expanded 
over  a  sect;  "the  temple  of  the  Lord,  the  temple  of  the 
Lord,  the  temple  of  the  Lord,  are  we."  It  is  arrogance  and 
pride  indulged,  and  erected  into  a  virtue.  This  is  one  of 
the  greatest  triumphs  of  error  and  sin,  when  it  can  be  en- 
shrined into  a  form  of  duty. 

On  the  other  side  it  is  not  so  bad,  but  the  same  imitative 
tendency  prevails.  Men,  for  a  rule  of  practice,  if  not  of 
faith,  look  not  so  much  to  God's  word  as  to  men.  The 
garb  of  piety  is  worn,  which  is  conformable  to  good  usage. 
Christian  society  is  the  mirror,  in  which  men  dress  and 
undress  their  souls  for  God.  In  this  case  it  is  the  grega- 
rious tendency  of  human  nature,  the  same  principle  that 
leads  a  flock  of  sheep  straight  over  a  stone  wall  on  one 
another's  heels  into  green  pastures.  Unfortunately  in  this 
case  it  does  not  lead  into  green  pasture,  but  away  from  it. 
Society,  society,  says  Madame  de  Stael,  how  it  makes  the 
heart  hard  and  the  mind  frivolous  !  how  it  leads  us  to  live 
for  what  men  will  say  of  us  !  This  is  a  great  evil,  this 
living  for  what  men  will  say  of  us,  instead  of  what  God 
has  said  for  us  ;  but  it  is  greater  in  the  church  than  in 
the  world.  It  is  surprising  how  powerfully  men  will  si- 
lently sustain  one  another  in  practical  error,  and  almost 
paralyze  their  own  consciences  and  the  word  of  God  in  so 
doing.  "  Although,"  says  Lord  Bacon,  "  our  persons  live 
in  the  view  of  heaven,  yet  our  spirits  are  included  in  the 
caves  of  our  own  complexions  and  customs,  which  minister 
unto  us  infinite  errors  and  vain  opinions,  if  they  be  not 
recalled  to  examination." 

IV.  A  fourth  cause  which  we  shall  mention,  though 
perhaps  more  strictly  it  is  part  of  the  third,  is  the  habit  of 
deference  to  human  authority,  and  the  study  of  theology 
by  systems  and  names,  instead  of  the  Scriptures.  Hence 
an  inquisitorial  tendency,  and  the  putting  of  books  of 
human  origin  as  standards  of  opinion.  One  man  makes  a 
Procrustes'  bed  out  of  Locke  on  the  Human  Understand- 


•«J?  AND    THAT    OF    IMITATION.  359 

ing;  another  out  of  Edwards  on  the  Will.  We  think 
this  would  not  be  the  case,  if  we  lived  more  upon  God's 
word.  Nothing  tends  so  much  to  produce  a  manly  inde- 
pendence and  a  genuine  gospel  liberty  of  thought  and  feel- 
ing as  a  simple  reliance  upon  God's  word,  and  an  uncon- 
ditional submission  to  it.  This  habit  of  deference  to 
human  authority  grew  up  in  the  pastures  of  Popery  and 
Paganism.  At  one  time  men  went  mad  with  worship  of 
Aristotle ;  then  again  of  Plato ;  then  of  Duns  Scotus  and 
Thomas  Aquinas ;  and  neglect  of  God's  word  personally 
and  individually,  has  permitted  the  church  of  Christ  in 
every  age  to  have  her  Aristotles  and  Platos,  her  Dunses, 
and  Aquinases.  We  cannot  but  behold  a  proof  of  this  ten- 
dency, this  love  of  borrowed  light,  and  this  habitual  reli- 
ance upon  other  things,  rather  than  the  word  of  God,  even 
in  our  own  republication  of  the  admirable  tomes  of  divinity 
and  Christian  experience  in  the  seventeenth  century.  The 
movement,  undoubtedly,  is  ominous  of  good,  and  not  of 
evil;  and  it  indicates  the  beginning  of  a  better  relish,  as 
well  as  the  poverty  of  our  own  stores.  But  we  are  also  in 
danger,  while  pursuing  the  streams,  of  being  led  away 
from  the  fountain,  and  of  omitting  the  same  enthusiastic 
love  and  study  of  the  word  of  God  experimentally,  which 
knit  up  into  so  great  stature  the  giants  of  a  past  theological 
age.  We  are  very,  very  far  from  undervaluing  the  labors 
of  learned  men,  or  the  treasures  of  thought  and  experience 
digged  out  of  the  mines  of  God's  word  by  their  holy  and 
enthusiastic  industry.  But  we  do  say,  that  if  we  neglect 
the  same  labors,  because  great  men  of  a  past  age  entered 
into  them,  and  because,  therefore,  we  may  do  without 
them  ;  if  we  take  their  treasures,  and  the  treasures  which 
they  spread  before  their  own  age,  to  use,  in  our  admiration, 
instead  of  digging  those  mines  ourselves  anew,  for  our  own 
age,  and  for  our  own  souls,  then  farewell  to  all  originality 
and  power  ;  then  will  our  religion  continue  to  be  a  religion 
of  imitation  instead  of  experience.     If  this  is  to  be  the 


360 


THE    RELIGION    OF    EXPERIENCE, 


result,  it  were  better  that  every  tome  of  divinity,  and  every 
record  of  Christian  experience,  were  burned  as  soon  as  it 
should  see  the  b'ght.  In  this  view  we  admire  the  nobleness 
of  Luther,  when  the  pope's  bull  of  excommunication  was 
published,  and  they  began  to  burn  the  Reformer's  books. 
"  Let  them  destroy  my  works,"  said  he  ;  "I  desire  nothing 
better;  for  all  I  w^anted  was  to  lead  Christians  to  the 
Bible,  that  they  might  afterwards  throw  away  my  writings. 
Great  God !  if  we  had  but  a  right  understanding  of  the 
Holy  Scriptures,  what  need  would  there  be  of  my  books  ?" 
O  how  noble  is  this  !  How  characteristic  of  a  soul  that 
had  drunk  deep  for  its  own  self  into  the  Bible,  and  would 
have  every  other  soul  go  and  plunge  into  the  same  fountain 
of  blessedness,  and  drink,  and  continue  to  drink,  there  and 
there  only.  We  love  Luther  for  this  noble  declaration. 
And  sure  we  are  that  his  works,  fresh  and  powerful  as  they 
are,  and  the  works  of  every  other  uninspired  man,  though 
you  coUecJi  the  whole  circle  of  possible  mental  develop- 
ments, between  the  genius  of  Baxter  and  that  of  Leighton, 
when  compared  with  God's  word,  are  but  as  winking  tapers 
in  the  light  of  a  noonday  sun.  And  what  should  we  think 
of  the  man  who,  if  a  set  of  gas-lights  were  hung  up  to  burn 
in  the  streets  at  noonday,  should  go  about  endeavoring  to 
walk  by  their  light,  or  perpetually  calling  upon  you  to 
admire  their  glory,  while  he  scarcely  seems  aware  that  the 
sun  above  him,  like  the  very  face  of  God,  is  shining  with 
such  splendor,  as  almost  to  put  out  those  pale  and  ineffect- 
ual fires  ? 

This  being  the  case,  on  a  comparison  even  of  the  richly 
spiritual  divines  of  the  seventeenth  century  with  inspiration, 
how  much  more  with  reference  to  those  writers  called  the 
Christian  Fathers,  comprehending  so  wide  and  chaotic  a 
gathering  of  spoils  and  opinions  in  what  Milton  calls  the 
drag-net  of  antiquity.  It  would  be  difficult  to  depict  the 
ineffable  absurdity  of  sending  back  the  Christians  of  this 
generation  into  the  twilight  of   Romish  superstition  and 


AND    THAT    OF    IMITATION.  361 

philosophy,  to  interpret  Scripture  by  tradition  from  the 
Fathers.  Often  as  we  see  this  attempted  exaltation  of  the 
early  doctors  of  the  church  into  the  place  of  supremacy  over 
our  own  faith  and  opinion  as  founded  on  the  Scriptures,  we 
think  of  Taylor's  powerful  and  beautiful  delineation  of  the 
contrast  between  those  doctors  after  the  time  of  Christ,  and 
the  Jewish  prophets  before  him.  ''  It  must  be  acknowledged 
that  the  writers  of  the  ancient  dispensation  were  such  as 
those  should  be,  who  were  looking  onward  towards  the 
bright  day  of  gospel  splendor ;  while  the  early  Christian 
doctors  were  just  such  as  one  might  well  expect  to  find 
those,  who  were  looking  onward  toward  that  deep  night  of 
superstition,  which  covered  Europe  during  the  middle  ages. 
The  dawn  is  seen  to  be  gleaming  upon  the  foreheads  of  the 
one  class  of  writers,  while  a  sullen  gloom  overshadows  the 
brows  of  the  other." 

If  these  remarks  apply  with  any  justice  to  books  of  prac- 
tical divinity,  much  more  do  they  to  systems  aad  books  of 
theoretical  speculation.  For  the  student  to  let  these  pre- 
vent him  from  drinking  in  his  theology  originally  and  for 
himself  at  God's  word,  or  to  drink  at  these  first,  and  form 
his  taste  there,  and  mould  his  opinions,  and  then,  under  the 
influence  of  that  taste,  and  by  the  light  of  those  opinions,  to 
go  to  the  Bible,  and  study  it  more  or  less  under  a  cloud  of 
prejudice,  or  if  not  under  prejudice,  at  least  in  the  attitude 
of  a  systematic  theologian,  rather  than  as  a  child,  a  learner, 
a  former  of  his  own  system  from  divine  truth  by  the  Spirit 
of  God,  is  to  deprive  his  soul  of  the  blessed  elements  of 
freshness  and  original  power ;  it  is  to  keep  him  from  ever 
knowing  the  power  of  God's  word ;  it  is  to  make  his  reli- 
gion the  religion  of  imitation,  and  not  that  of  experience. 

We  shall  here  strengthen  our  positions  by  some  profound 
remarks  of  Lord  Bacon.  "  As  for  perfection  or  complete- 
ness in  divinity,"  says  he,  "it  is  not  to  be  sought;  which 
makes  this  course  of  artificial  divinity  the  more  suspect 
For  he  that  will  reduce  a  knowledge  into  an  art,  will  make 

16 


362  THE    RELIGION    OF    EXPERIENCE,  T^ 

it  round  and  uniform :  but  in  divinity  many  things  must 
be  left  abrupt,  and  concluded  with  this :  O  the  depth  of  the 
wisdom  and  knowledge  of  God  !  how  incomprehensible  are 
his  judgments,  and  his  ways  past  finding  out !  So,  again, 
the  Apostle  saith.  Ex  pat'ie  sciimis  :  and  to  have  the  form 
of  a  total,  when  there  is  but  matter  for  a  part,  cannot  be 
without  supplies  by  supposition  and  presumption.  And 
therefore  I  conclude,  that  the  true  use  of  these  terms  and 
methods  hath  place  in  institutions  or  introductions  prepara- 
tory unto  knowledge  ;  but  in  them,  or  by  deducement  from 
them,  to  handle  the  main  body  and  substance  of  a  knowl- 
edge, is  in  all  sciences  prejudicial,  and  in  divinity  danger- 
ous." Lord  Bacon  likewise  speaks  of  "  the  over  early  and 
peremptory  reduction  of  knowledge  into  arts  and  methods  ; 
from  which  time  commonly  sciences  receive  small  or  no 
augmentation.  But  as  young  men,  when  they  knit  and 
shape  perfectly,  do  seldom  grow  to  a  farther  stature ;  so 
knowledge,  while  it  is  in  aphorisms  and  observations,  it  is 
in  growth  ;  but  when  it  once  is  comprehended  in  exact 
methods,  it  may,  perchance,  be  farther  polished  and  illus- 
trated, and  accommodated  for  use  and  practice ;  but  it  in- 
creaseth  no  more  in  bulk  and  substance.'^ 

The  truth  is,  that  no  real  advance  can  be  made  in  theol- 
ogy, except  by  experience.  It  implies  two  things  :  knowl- 
edge of  self,  and  knowledge  of  God  ;  and  in  truth,  as  self 
can  be  known  only  by  knowing  God,  all  advance  in  theol- 
ogy, either  man- ward  or  God- ward,  depends  upon  divine 
grace.  There  is  a  passage  in  Zuingle's  experience  of  great 
importance  on  this  point.  "  Philosophy  and  theology,"  said 
he,  "  were  constantly  raising  difficulties  in  my  mind.  At 
length  I  was  brought  to  say  we  must  leave  these  things, 
and  endeavor  to  enter  into  God's  thoughts  in  his  own  word. 
I  applied  myself  in  earnest  prayer  to  the  Lord,  to  give  me 
his  light ;  and  though  I  read  nothing  but  Scripture,  its 
sense  became  clearer  to  me  than  if  I  had  studied  many 
commentators."      "  I   study   the    doctors,"    said   Zuingle, 


AND    THAT    OF    IMITATION.  363 

"just  as  you  ask  a  friend  How  do  you  understand  this?" 
So,  indeed,  to  neglect  other  writers,  as  if  we  could  advance 
as  well  without  them,  would  be  pride  and  presumption  ; 
but  there  is  a  great  difference  in  the  mode  of  consulting 
them.  A  man,  for  example,  on  reading  Edwards's  history 
of  Redemption,  cannot  fail  to  make  a  great  advance,  by 
the  aid  of  such  comprehensive  views,  such  a  holy  general- 
ization of  particulars,  by  a  mind  distinguished  for  this  rare 
faculty.  But  this  is  not  a  book  of  systematic  theology ; 
and  such  a  course  of  reading,  and  reading  after  and  with 
a  personal  study  of  God's  word,  is  very  different  from  the 
consultation  of  systems  and  systematic  writers,  who,  in 
the  very  fact  of  striving  after  the  completeness  of  their 
system,  may  prove  unsuitable  teachers.  "By  making 
authors  dictators,"  says  Lord  Bacon,  "  that  their  words 
should  stand,  and  not  consuls  to  give  advice,  the  damage 
is  infinite  that  sciences  have  received  thereby,  as  the  prin- 
ciple cause  that  hath  kept  them  low,  at  a  stay,  without 
growth  or  advancement." 

There  is  all  the  difference  between  the  study  of  theology 
in  books,  at  second  hand,  and  in  the  Bible  with  original 
experience,  that  there  is  between  a  man's  acquaintance 
with  a  romantic  country,  who  goes  straight  through  it  in 
a  rail-car,  and  his  who  travels  as  a  pedestrian,  over  hill  and 
valley,  through  city  and  hamlet,  in  meadows  and  by  the 
river-side,  calling  at  the  peasant's  door,  visiting  many  a 
sweet  nook  and  shady  fountain,  breathing  the  morning 
freshness,  enjoying  the  sunset  and  the  twilight,  drinking  in, 
at  every  step  of  the  way,  all  the  blessed  influences  of  the 
air  and  the  sunshine,  and  watching  all  the  lovely  and 
changeful  aspects  of  the  face  of  nature.  There  are  excel- 
lent rail-carriages  to  ride  through  the  Bible ;  perhaps  the 
human  mind  will  never  invent  better  ones  than  some  that 
have  been  constructed.  You  may  take  passage  in  Calvin's 
Institutes,  or  Turretin,  or,  if  you  please,  in  Ridgley's  body 
of  divinity,  or  in  Knapp,  or  in  Storr  and  Flatt ;  and  assur- 


864  THE    RELIGION    OF    EXPERIENCE, 

ed]y  you  cannot  greatly  err;  but  all  this  richness  and 
blessedness  of  personal  experience,  and  all  the  triumph  and 
delight  of  individual  discovery,  and  all  the  romance,  novelty 
and  freshness  of  pedestrian  excursions,  and  all  the  power, 
variety,  and  certainty  of  original  knowledge,  you  must 
utterly  forego. 

There  is  a  stream  artificially  walled  up  in  the  valley  of 
Saratoga,  into  which  the  healthful  mineral  waters  of  the 
various  springs  pour  themselves  off  together,  after  welling 
up  independently  at  the  fountain  head.  Now,  suppose  the 
visitors  at  Saratoga,  in  search  of  health,  should  go  to  that 
running  stream,  and  prefer  the  taste  of  it,  telling  you  in 
what  a  perfect  unity,  in  what  a  comprehensive,  system, 
they  receive  the  waters,  by  thus  drinking  of  them ;  and 
suppose  that  men  should  thus  test  their  remedial  excellence 
in  their  own  complaints,  and  should  profess  to  analyze  the 
elemental  fountains  by  the  study  of  that  stream,  visiting 
the  original  sources  now  and  then,  but  dwelling  ordinarily 
at  the  brook,  and  drinking  of  it  habitually;  these  men 
would  not  unaptly  represent  the  folly  of  a  man,  who  should 
study  the  word  of  God,  and  form  his  opinions  of  its  funda- 
mental truths,  principally  by  the  streams  of  theology  that 
have  sprung  from  it,  by  human  systems  and  institutes. 

Even  if  the  church  universal  could  build  a  perfect  con- 
duit, still  would  we  never  give  up  the  right  of  private 
judgment,  nor  the  duty  of  each  student  of  the  Scriptures 
to  form  his  theology  originally  for  himself.  Let  him  go  to 
the  deep  well-springs,  the  separate  individual  fountains  in 
the  Old  and  New  Testaments,  and  let  him  drink  their 
sparkling  contents  fresh  and  pure  in  the  clearness  of  their 
original  and  individual  dialects.  Let  him  do  this  to  form 
his  own  theology,  or  rather  to  make  the  theology  of  the 
Scriptures  possess  and  imbue  his  soul.  Let  him  do  this  to 
fill  full  and  keep  ever  overflowing  the  fountain  of  his  own 
experience,  joyous  and  rich,  strong  and  abundant.  Let 
him  do  this,  striving  all  the  while   mightily  in  prayer  for 


AND    THAT    OF    IMITATION. 


365 


that  baptism  of  the  Spirit,  which  alone  can  make  the  truths 
of  Scripture  his  own  powerful,  original,  life-giving  expe- 
rience. This  process  makes  ^  true,  independent,  biblical 
theologian ;  entire  dependence  on  the  word  and  Spirit  of 
God,  entire  independence  of  human  systems  as  authorities. 
If  we  are  not  greatly  mistaken,  this  course  is  taught  and 
commanded  in  the  Scriptures ;  and  if  the  history  of  indi- 
vidual minds  be  not  utterly  erroneous,  this  course  clothes 
the  soul  with  power ;  it  makes  the  Christian  a  king  and  a 
priest  unto  God.  It  does  this,  just  in  proportion  as  he  re- 
fuses every  mediator  between  his  own  soul  and  the  word 
of  God ;  just  in  proportion  as  he  receives  in  simplicity  the 
engrafted  word,  which  is  able  to  save  his  soul;  just  in  pro- 
portion as  he  lives  upon  it,  and  in  his  own  spiritual  con- 
flicts, in  prayer  and  in  profound  meditation,  and  by  the 
baptism  of  the  Holy  Spirit,  makes  its  experience  his  own 
experience.  This  is  power,  wisdom,  blessedness,  glory. 
This  comprehends  all  the  elements  of  a  missionary  piety. 
"  I  had  rather  follow  the  shadow  of  Christ,"  said  the  noble 
Reformer  and  Martyr,  Bishop  Hooper,  "  than  the  body  of 
all  the  general  councils  or  doctors  since  the  death  of  Christ. 
It  is  mine  opinion  unto  all  the  world,  that  the  Scripture 
solely,  and  the  Apostles'  church  is  to  be  followed,  and  no 
man's  authority,  be  he  Augustine,  TertuUian,  or  even 
Cherubim  or  Seraphim." 

V.  A  fifth  cause  for  the  imitative  cast  of  piety  in  this 
age,  we  take  to  be  the  prevalence  of  a  philosophical  system 
unfavorable  to  religious  faith.  Whatever  throws  the  mind 
in  upon  itself,  and  the  soul  upon  God,  begets  originality  and 
power ;  whatever  throws  it  upon  external  supports  and 
mediums  of  proof,  weakens  it.  There  are  two  principal 
things  in  philosophy — intuition  and  experience  ;  the  first 
may  be  compared  to  a  compass,  the  second  to  a  chart. 
You  may  sail  your  ship  a  great  way  by  the  first,  and 
yet  throw  her  on  the  rocks,  if  you  strive  to  make  a  harbor 
without  the  last.     On  the  other  hand,  without  the  compass, 


366  THE    RELIGION    OF    EXPERIENCE, 

the  chart  would  be  of  little  use  to  you ;  for  you  might  have 
a  correct  chart  of  the  coast  of  Europe,  and  yet,  without  the 
compass,  sail  for  years  in  a  circle  on  the  Atlantic,  endeav- 
oring to  find  Europe.  So  it  is  with  intuition  and  experi- 
ence ;  if  the  denial  of  the  last  leaves  you  with  nothing  but 
terra  incognita^  the  denial  of  the  first  leaves  you  without 
terra  firma.  A  philosophy  that  denies  the  first,  is  like  a 
fog  in  the  atmosphere  ;  if  you  sail  upon  the  ocean  of  truth 
in  such  a  fog,  you  must  either  do  it  by  the  lead  and  line, 
till  you  might  almost,  from  disuse,  deny  the  existence  of 
the  compass,  or,  if  you  dash  onward,  you  are  as  likely  to 
strike  a  reef  of  rocks,  as  to  get  into  the  harbor. 

The  prevalence  of  a  philosophy  that  throws  men  upon 
external  things,  united  with  the  experimental  and  physical 
spirit  of  this  age,  has  tended  to  withdraw  men's  minds  from 
the  sublime  and  simple  verities  of  God's  word.  An  experi- 
mental tendency  in  one  direction  is  infidelity  ;  in  another 
it  is  faith.  Confined  to  second  causes,  it  is  infidelity  ;  but 
if  men  would  put  experience  as  the  standard  in  divine  things, 
as  they  do  in  human,  it  would  be  well.  All  true  religion 
is  experimental.  Hence  the  course  of  infidelity  is  the  most 
unphilosophical  in  the  world,  while  to  some  extent  its  prin- 
ciple is  perfectly  wise  and  philosophical.  It  refuses  to  be- 
lieve, except  on  experience ;  very  well :  but  it  refuses  to 
try  the  experiment,  nay,  it  would,  if  possible,  destroy  the 
experiment.  A  Brahmin  was  once  persuaded  by  an  Eng- 
lishman to  look  through  a  microscope  at  a  vegetable,  which 
constituted  a  favorite  part  of  his  diet.  To  the  horror  of  the 
meat-abjuring  Indian,  he  beheld  whole  herds  of  animals 
quietly  browsing  in  their  pastures,  which  he  had  been  ac- 
customed to  eat  at  a  mouthful.  He  seized  the  instrument, 
in  his  anger,  trod  on  it,  and  crushed  it  to  pieces.  So  the 
world  are  very  ready  to  do  with  demonstrations  that  they 
do  not  like,  or  that  oppose  their  favorite  systems,  or  show 
their   sins.     Infidelity  and   the   Roman    Catholic  religion 


AND   THAT    OF    IMITATION.  367 

would  destroy,  or  keep  out  of  sight,  the  heavenly  instrument 
that  exposes  their  own  iniquity  and  error. 

This  empirical  spirit  in  divine  things,  exercised  in  dog- 
matism, but  stopping  short  of  faith,  makes  an  age  proud 
and  critical,  rather  than  humble  and  believing.  There  is  a 
great  difference  between  an  age  of  belief  and  an  age  of 
criticism  ;  all  the  difference  that  there  is  between  creative 
power  and  the  power  of  judgment.  An  age  of  belief  will 
be  employed  in  creative  operations,  leaving  the  lower  work 
of  criticism  to  be  performed  by  those  who  come  after.  An 
age  of  criticism  is  an  age  of  doubt,  and  therefore  of  weak- 
ness, not  of  inborn  power.  It  is  an  age  of  the  preparation 
of  rules,  not  of  principles  in  action,  in  vivifying  operation  ; 
and  so  it  is  an  age  of  the  understanding  of  rules,  not  the 
consciousness  of  principles-  Perhaps  principles  will  even 
be  denied,  and  the  rules  of  empiricism  alone  adopted.  Just 
as  if  in  medicine  there  should  be  an  age  of  physicians  formed 
in  the  apothecary's  shop,  by  the  study  of  formulas,  symp- 
toms and  cases,  instead  of  the  powers  of  nature,  the  laws 
of  the  human  constitution,  and  the  principles  of  things.  It 
is  not  to  be  denied  that  such  a  set  of  men  might  go  very 
far,  might  come  to  great  perfection,  in  the  knowledge  and 
classification  of  symptoms,  cases  and  cures  ;  it  would  be  an 
age  of  great  proficiency  in  diagnosis ;  but  do  we  not  see 
that  just  in  proportion  to  the  perfection  of  such  knowledge, 
if  we  stop  there,  we  are  at  the  greater  distance  from  wisdom 
and  power,  from  the  seeds  of  things,  and  the  elements  of 
universality  ?  As  in  general  an  age  of  systems  stops  the 
discovery  of  new  truth,  so  an  age  of  criticism  stops  the 
search  for  it-  Homer  and  Thucydides  mark  a  creative 
age ;  Quinctilian  and  Longinus,  a  critical  one  ;  this  is  im- 
itative, artificial,  that  is  original  and  spontaneous. 

In  regard  to  the  general  subject  of  metaphysics,  in  con- 
nection with  divinity,  it  is  almost  an  undeniable  truth,  that 
in  every  age  the  predominant  metaphysical  opinions,  the 
speculative  philosophy  in  general  acceptance,  will  influence 


368  THE    RELIGION    OF    EXPERIENCE, 

the  theology,  and  so,  in  an  incalculable  degree,  the  piety  of 
that  age.     The  history  of  the  church  shows  this,  and  some- 
times in  a  most  melancholy  demonstration.     The  possibility 
of  articles  of  faith,  their  compatibility  with  the  laws  of  rea- 
son, is  to  be  determined  on  metaphysicai  principles.     The 
question  whether  they  are  agreeable  to  reason,  or  contrary 
to  it,  or  simply  undiscoverable  by  it,  will  be  determined  ac- 
cording to  a  man's  metaphysics.     Now,  if  that  science  be 
one  that  in  its  first  principles  rejects  the  possibility  of  intui- 
tions of  spiritual  truths,  the  communion  of  the  mind,  through 
reason,  with  principles  that  could  not  be  made  known  to  it 
through  the  senses,  then  the  consequence  must  be  a  denial 
of  all  mysterious  truths  in  religion,  of  all  truths  that  are 
above  the  reach  of  the  unaided  human  understanding.     "  In 
each  article  of  faith  embraced  on  conviction,  the  mind  de- 
termines, first,  intuitively  on  its  logical  possibility  ;  secondly, 
discursively  on  its  analogy  to  doctrines  already  believed,  as 
well  as  on  its  correspondences  to  the  wants  and  faculties  of 
our  nature  ;  and,  thirdly,  historically  on  the  direct  and  in- 
direct evidences."     Now,  it  is  manifest  that,  if  on  meta- 
physical principles  the  first  determination  of  the  mind,  in 
respect  to  any  such  article  of  faith,  be,  that  it  is  a  logical 
impossibility,  all  its  historical  evidence,  and  all  its  alleged 
correspondency  to  our  wants,  and  analogy  to  other  doctrines, 
will  go  for  nothing.     "  The  question,"  says  Mr.  Coleridge, 
"  whether  an  assertion  be  in  itself  inconceivable,  or  only  by 
us  unimaginable,  will  be  decided  by  each  individual,  accord- 
ing to  the  positions  assumed  as  first  principles  in  the  meta- 
physical system  which  he  had  previously  adopted.     Thus 
the  existence  of  the  Supreme  Reason,  the  creator  of  the 
material  universe,  involved  a  contradiction  for  a  disciple  of 
Epicurus  ;  while,  on  the  contrary,  to  a  Platonist  the  posi- 
tion is  necessarily  presupposed  in  every  other  truth,  as  thai 
without  which   every  fact  of  experience  would  involve  a 
contradiction  in  reason." 

Just  so  a  Unitarian  denies  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity,  as 


AND    THAT    OF    IMITATION.  369 

a  metaphysical  impossibility,  setting  a  metaphysical  lie  above 
the  verity  of  the  Scriptures  ;  and,  in  general,  a  great  cause 
of  weakness  and  of  lying  doctrine  in  this  age,  is  the  march- 
ing of  metaphysical  speculations  into  regions  where  they  do 
not  belong.  It  is  true  that  our  philosophy,  even  where  it 
is  correct,  is  very  short-sighted,  and  that  in  most  cases,  as 
the  Indians  say  of  the  world  that  it  rests  first  upon  a  moun- 
tain, then  upon  an  elephant,  and  so  on  till  they  come  to  a 
tortoise,  where  they  stop ;  so  it  is  with  us  in  attempting  to 
explain  the  mysteries  of  our  being ;  our  philosophy  generally 
ends  with  the  tortoise.  It  is  true,  also,  that  the  multitude, 
even  of  educated  minds,  receive  metaphysical  principles 
upon  trust,  without  the  least  analysis  of  their  nature,  and 
with  no  perception  of  the  extensive  reach  of  their  influence  ; 
and  in  such  cases,  with  the  believer  in  God's  word,  where 
the  received  metaphysics  are  false,  there  is  a  happy  and 
ignorant  inconsistency  between  the  false  metaphysics  and 
the  spiritual  faith.  But  still  it  is  impossible  that  a  false 
s}'stem  of  metaphysics  should  prevail,  without  exerting  a 
powerful  deteriorating  influence  over  every  province  of  mind 
and  morals.  The  student  and  the  Christian  may  never  at 
any  one  moment  be  conscious  of  that  influence,  for  that 
would  be  to  see  the  falsehood  of  the  system  ;  but  the  influ- 
ence is  felt,  and  is  the  more  powerful  for  being  impercep- 
tible, unsuspected,  and,  therefore,  unresisted.  It  is  an  ele- 
ment of  deterioration  in  the  presence  of  every  spiritual  truth, 
depriving  it  of  half  its  power  ;  an  influence  that  insensibly 
stupefies  the  mind  itself,  and  dwarfs  all  its  productions. 
You  may  not  notice  it  while  within  its  circle  ;  but  just  re- 
move into  another  atmosphere,  and  you  will  see  what  you 
have  been  suffering  and  what  you  have  been  losing.  It  is 
like  being  shut  up  for  hours  in  a  close,  ill-ventilated,  and 
crowded  lecture-room  ;  the  air  becomes  very  impure,  but 
you,  being  accustomed  to  it,  hardly  notice  the  impurity,  nor 
the  deleterious  influence  over  your  system,  till  you  go  out 
into  the  fresh  atmosphere  ;  and  then  if  you  should  again  re- 

16* 


370 


THE    RELIGION    OF    EXPERIENCE, 


turn  into  the  room,  where  so  many  lungs  have  been  respir- 
ing till  the  vital  properties  of  the  air  have  been  almost  ex- 
hausted, you  could  not  endure  it.  So  it  is  with  the  inju- 
rious influence  which  a  prevailing  false  system  of  meta- 
physics will  inevitably  exert  over  the  student's  mind.  The 
sublimities  of  the  gospel  itself  will  be  deprived  of  half  their 
grandeur,  and  in  that  unwholesome  vapor,  everything  will 
be  pallid,  meagre,  lifeless,  and  cold.  The  clouds  raised 
around  the  truths  of  the  gospel  through  the  medium  of 
grovelling  metaphysical  speculations  are  not,  as  in  the  natu- 
ral atmosphere,  converted  into  glorious  shapes,  reflecting  the 
sun's  glory.  Tliey  darken  the  truth,  and  it  looks  through 
them,  shorn  of  its  beams.  The  power  of  self-evidence  that 
belongs  to  the  things  of  religion  is  taken  away,  and  the 
truth,  instead  of  commanding  assent  in  all  the  absolute 
majesty  of  the  Supreme  Reason,  timidly  and  doubtfully  en- 
treats admittance  to  the  heart.  It  cannot  be  otherwise,  if 
the  truths  of  theology  grow  up  into  a  metaphysical  system 
that  in  its  first  principles,  if  logically  pressed,  denies  their 
possibility.  The  denial  may  not  be  open,  may  not  be  ob- 
served^ but  the  deteriorating  influence  will  certainly  be  ex- 
erted. And  so  sure  as  there  is  discernment  enough  to  see 
that  influence,  combined  with  a  sceptical  disposition,  the 
skepticism  in  the  heart  will  take  refuge  in  the  metaphysics 
of  the  understanding,  and  there  manufacture  and  thence 
send  forth  its  attacks  against  the  elements  of  spiritual  faith. 
Thus  it  is  that  infidel  speculations,  grounded  on  false  meta- 
physical premises,  and  concocted  in  the  closet  by  specula- 
tive men,  have  found  their  way  to  the  hearts  of  a  common 
multitude,  who  know  nothing  about  metaphysics,  good  or 
bad,  except  the  name,  but  take  the  scepticism  as  the  per- 
fection of  reason  and  common  sense. 

Now,  we  say  that  anything  which  weakens  the  power  of 
self-evidence  in  the  gospel  must  inevitably  exert  a  disas- 
trous influence  over  our  piety ;  and  if  there  have  been 
such  an  ingredient  in  the  prevalent  philosophy  of  this  age, 


AND    THAT    OF    IMITATION.  371 

this  is  one  cause  for  our  want  of  originality  and  experi- 
ence. 

VI.  A  sixth  cause  why  the  piety  of  this  age  is  weak 
and  imitative,  is  to  be  found  in  the  neglect  and  ignorance 
of  the  doctrine  of  justification  by  faith.  We  do  not  know 
of  a  single  evangelical  doctrine  that  has  suffered  such  sad 
oversight.  Perhaps  one  reason  may  be,  that  we  have  been 
occupied  with  controversies  for  other  truths,  and  with 
enemies  in  other  parts  of  the  citadel,  so  frequently  as  to 
forget  this  danger ;  but  whatever  be  the  cause,  we  have 
well-nigh  forgotten  the  doctrine,  and  to  depart  from  it  is  to 
exhaust  the  very  fountain  of  strength  in  our  spiritual  being. 
The  life  of  the  doctrine  of  the  blessed  reformers,  and  the 
light  of  their  existence,  was  their  experimental  knowledge 
of  this  truth,  which  we  know  so  partially.  We  have  looked 
upon  it  too  much  as  a  negative  speculation  ;  they  regarded 
it  as  a  positive  life ;  we  study  it,  they  possessed  it ;  we 
acknowledge  it,  and  put  it  in  our  creeds ;  they  lived  by  it, 
and  died  for  it.  The  consequence  is,  that  it  energizes  all 
their  productions ;  from  this  cause  alone  their  spirit  and  style 
are  as  different  from  the  inert  prettinesses  of  this  age,  as 
the  transfiguration  by  Raphael  from  a  modern  lithographic 
engraving  of  the  same,  or  as  a  great  Gothic  Cathedral  from 
a  gingerbread  wooden  imitation.  We  know  not  what  we 
lose,  nor  how  far  we  die,  when  we  lose  the  spirit  of  this 
doctrine.  The  church  is  devoted  to  destruction,  if  this 
grace  goes  out  of  the  temple ;  and  we  may  almost  hear 
our  guardian  angels  mournfully  whispering,  Let  us  depart 
hence.  As  the  atonement  is  the  central  doctrine  of  the 
Gospel,  so  an  experimental  knowledge  of  justification  by 
faith  is  the  central  grace  in  the  heart  of  the  Christian  and 
the  church.  If  it  be  out  of  place,  all  other  graces  will 
hang  loosely ;  if  it  be  deficient,  all  other  graces  will  wither 
and  waste  as  by  a  slow  poison.  In  the  piety  of  this  age  it 
is  deficient ;  it  is  out  of  place,  pushed  from  its  office ;  in 
some  quarters  it  is  disowned,  and  well-nigh  annihilated ; 


372  THE    RELIGFON    OF    EXPERIENCE, 

everywhere  there  is  great  ignorance  and  inexperience  of  it ; 
and  the  consequence  is,  that  on  the  one  hand  sanctification 
is  exalted  into  a  Saviour,  and  on  the  other,  formalists  and 
priests  and  admirers  of  gilded  crosses,  despising  sanctifi- 
cation and  justification  almost  alike,  are  busily  vamping 
up  the  trumpery  of  Popery  in  its  stead.  Instead  of  this 
reigning  and  radiant  truth  presented  and  developed,  they 
chant  to  us  the  lo  Paean  of  a  baptismal  regeneration,  with 
candles  at  noonday,  and  fish  on  Friday ;  they  sing  to  us 
delicately  about  the  sacred  beauty  of  the  observance  of 
sacred  days,  and  sacred  rites  and  ordinances.  With  what 
energy  would  Paul  have  rebuked  this  spirit !  What  ?  he 
would  say,  hath  Christ,  at  such  expense  of  blood,  set  you 
free  from  the  destruction  of  the  Man  of  Sin ;  and  will  ye 
again  pass  under  the  accursed  yoke  ?  Will  ye  enter  your 
prison-house  of  will-worship,  to  grind  in  its  filthy  dungeons  ? 
How,  turn  ye  again  to  the  weak  and  beggarly  elements, 
whereunto  ye  desire  again  to  be  in  bondage  ?  Ye  observe 
days,  and  months,  and  times,  and  years.  I  am  afraid  of 
you.  Behold  I,  Paul,  say  unto  you,  that  if  ye  be  circumcised, 
Christ  shall  profit  you  nothing :  ye  are  fallen  from  grace. 

But  it  is  not  those  alone,  who  would  worship  the  cross 
instead  of  the  crucified  Saviour,  the  altar  instead  of  the 
altar's  God,  that  have  abjured  this  doctrine,  or  betrayed  it 
into  the  hands  of  its  enemies ;  it  is  we  all,  just  in  pro- 
portion to  our  neglect  and  inexperience  of  its  life-giving 
power.  And  this  inexperience  is  great ;  and  every  man 
who  has  anything  to  do  with  the  admission  of  candidates 
to  the  church  of  Christ,  will  have  to  deplore  that  this  in- 
experience of  this  life-giving  truth  has  become  almost  the 
type  of  piety  in  our  new  converts,  so  that  you  may  perhaps 
find  a  greater  ignorance  of  this  than  of  any  other  doctrine 
in  the  Scriptures.  But  is  this  the  preparation  which  is 
needed  in  a  missionary  age,  which  should  characterize  the 
piety  of  an  age  that  hopes  to  accomplish  the  world's  regen- 
eration ?     We  need  a  new  baptism  in  the  fire  of  individual 


AND    THAT    OF    IMITATION.  373 

scriptural  truth,  but  more  than  all,  in  the  fire  of  this  truth 
of  justification  by  faith.  Doubtless,  there  is  a  power  in  his 
doctrine,  which  will  annihilate  every  form  of  Romanism ;  but 
it  must  be  felt,  in  order  to  be  used.  Was  it  exhausted  at 
the  Reformation,  when  we  saw  it  flash  so  gloriously  ? 
Why  does  it  not  flash  with  equal  glory  now,  when  its 
power  is  equally  needed  ?  It  did  but  half  its  work,  it 
disclosed  but  half  its  energy.  Perhaps  one  great  reason 
why,  under  God,  such  a  resurrection  of  refined  and  gilded 
formalism  is  now  permitted,  and  such  an  exaltation  of 
The  Church,  in  the  place  of  Christ,  is  to  call  all  true 
Christians,  by  the  very  emergency,  back  to  the  rock  and 
refuge  of  this  doctrine.  It  is  to  make  Chrisfs-men  instead 
of  Church-men.  And  sure  we  are,  that  if  Luther  were 
now  on  earth  to  publish  again  this  element  of  his  power, 
with  the  freshness  of  his  burning  experience,  to  pour  it 
from  the  depths  of  his  full  heart  as  from  a  church  organ, 
accustomed  as  we  are  to  think  that  we  know  all  about  it, 
it  would  stir  Christendom  now  with  almost  as  much  en- 
thusiasm, and  with  almost  as  great  a  convulsion,  as  it  did 
then. 

When  we  look  at  the  discipline  through  which  Luther 
and  some  other  men  passed,  in  their  baptism  with  the  fire 
of  this  doctrine,  it  seems  that  we  do  but  dream  about  it, 
that  we  know  nothing  of  it,  that  we  are  like  men  walking 
and  talking  in  our  sleep — a  race  of  religious  somnambulists. 
Indeed,  without  this  burning  experience,  what  are  we  doing, 
where  is  our  efficiency  ?  We  are  no  better  than  petrified 
monks,  and  might  almost  as  well  be  thrown  back  into 
past  darkness,  and  with  St.  Anthony  be  employed  in 
preaching  to  the  fishes  of  the  Atlantic.  We  might  as  well 
he  hooded  and  cowled  and  shrouded  in  the  cells  of  some 
old  monastery,  employed  in  doing  penance,  wearing  sack- 
cloth shirts,  telling  our  beads,  and  ascending  Pilate's  stair- 
case. The  indomitable  Luther  himself  once  set  out  to  do 
this  upon  his  knees ;  and  it  was  a  great  crisis  of  his  being ; 


374  THE    RELIGION    OF    EXPERIENCE, 

for  he  had  got  about  half  way  up,  when  there  came  a  voice 
of  thunder  into  his  soul.  The  just  shall  live  by  Faith  ! 
and  it  scared  him  effectually  and  forever  from  his  penance. 
There  are  numbers  in  our  day  who  are  ascending  Pilate's 
staircase ;  some  in  forms  and  ceremonies,  and  apostolical 
successions,  and  hatred  of  conventicles,  and  kneelings  to 
bishops,  and  Christless  worship  of  the  church,  and  contempt 
and  persecution  of  all  beyond  their  narrow  sect,  and  open 
and  avowed  hatred  of  justification  by  faith  ;  and  others  in 
the  forgetfulnesss,  disregard,  and  inexperience  of  this  blessed 
doctrine.  Would  to  God  that  such  a  voice  from  heaven 
might  enter  into  every  man's  soul ;  but  even  if  it  did,  it 
would  do  no  good,  without  something  of  Luther's  deep 
spiritual  experience,  gathered  in  conflict  and  prayer. 

We  need  it ;  we  all  need  it ;  it  is  the  want  of  this  that 
forms  the  chracteristic  palsy  of  the  piety  of  this  age.  With 
this  living  experience  of  Christ's  truth,  and  so  many 
Christians  in  motion  under  it,  no  false  form  of  religion 
could  stand  before  the  church  for  a  moment.  We  need  it 
as  ministers  of  the  gospel,  in  our  common,  ordinary  preach- 
ing. We  need  it  to  have  any  power  whatever  in  the  con- 
version of  men.  We  need  it,  to  have  our  new  converts 
baptized  into  it,  instead  of  the  spirit  of  indolence  and 
worldly  conformity.  We  need  it,  in  order  to  preach  from 
feeling  instead  of  imitation.  We  need  it,  to  break  up  the 
reign  of  custom,  and  to  let  in  upon  the  soul  the  unwonted 
freshness  of  a  first  love. 

May  God  in  mercy  baptize  every  one  of  us  with  this 
spirit.  May  the  church  possess  it.  May  the  spirit  and 
power  of  justification  by  faith  take  hold  upon  us  !  Then 
will  the  final  conflict  of  the  Gospel  against  Romanism, 
against  Formalism,  be  a  short  conflict  indeeed  ;  but  a  more 
glorious  triumph  of  God's  word  and  Spirit  than  the  world 
has  ever  witnessed. 

A  point  growing  out  of  this  last  named  cause  for  the 


AND    THAT    OF    IMITATION.  375 

want  of  experimental  originality  in  the  piety  of  this  age,  is 
the  imagined  discovery  of  a  royal  road  to  heaven.  We 
are  very  desirous  of  believing  that  we  can  live  at  ease,  and 
yet  gain  that  experience  which  other  men  gathered  only  by 
conflict  and  prayer.  We  should  like  to  possess  the  power- 
ful experience  of  faith  which  Luther  possessed,  and  which 
in  general  characterized  the  age  of  the  Reformers  ;  but  we 
are  not  willing  to  undergo  that  intense,  soul-trying,  spiritual 
discipline,  which  he  had  to  pass  through  in  gaining  it.  It 
is  the  mistake  of  this  age  to  make  of  religion  a  thing  of 
comfort  and  ease,  instead  of  self-mortification  and  labor. 
We  forget  that  in  its  very  essence,  religion  is  a  thing  of 
discipline,  self-mortifying  discipline,  and  that  the  principle 
of  vicarious  suffering  is  the  one  by  which  the  world  is  to 
be  converted  to  Christ,  just  as  certainly  as  it  is  that  in 
which  was  laid  the  very  foundations  of  the  world's  redemp- 
tion. Hence  the  Church  that  draws  back  from  the  baptism 
of  suffering,  is  not  the  church  that  can  be  instrumental  in 
this  world's  regeneration ;  and  if  the  church  in  our  age 
be  doing  this,  if  self-indulgence  be  the  mark  of  our  piety, 
it  is  as  clear  as  noonday  that  not  to  us  has  the  glorious 
commission  been  vouchsafed  of  accomplishing  the  promises 
of  God,  and  not  to  us  will  the  glory  ever  be  granted  of 
ushering  in  this  consummation.  It  was  the  beautiful  lan- 
guage of  the  poet  Cowper,  wrung  from  him  by  his  own 
experience  of  anguish. 

The  path  of  sorrow,  and  that  path  alone, 
Leads  to  the  land  where  sorrow  is  unknown. 

We  believe  that  this  must  not  only  be  the  experience  of 
every  individual  Christian  in  getting  to  heaven,  but  that 
the  church  by  which  the  world's  regeneration  shall  be  ac- 
complished, will  be  a  church  baptized  with  suffering,  or 
what  will  answer  the  same  purpose,  distinguished  for  vol- 
untary self-denial.  If  we  reject  this,  it  is  no  wonder  that 
our  piety  is  destitute  of  originality  and  vital  power ;  we 


376  THE    RELIGION    OF    EXPERIENCE, 

are  rejecting  that  which,  in  a  world  of  fallen  beings,  con- 
stitutes, in  the  very  nature  of  things,  the  only  source  of 
power.  Death,  said  Mr.  Coleridge,  only  supplies  the  oil  for 
the  inextinguishable  lamp  of  life.  This  great  truth  is  true 
even  before  our  mortal  dissolution  ;  that  death  to  self  which 
trial  produces,  constituting,  even  in  this  world,  the  very 
essence  of  strength,  life,  and  glory. 

Some  men  think  that  heaven  is  growing  up  on  earth,  a 
gradual  amelioration  and  melting  of  earth  into  heaven,  so 
that  by  and  by  half  the  Bible  will  get  obsolete,  because 
self-denial  and  affliction  will  no  longer  be  the  custom  of  our 
pilgrimage.  The  truth  is,  there  never  could  be  such  a 
«tate  of  external  things,  as  that  fallen  beings  could  be  pu- 
rified and  refined  without  burning  and  filing.  If  we  carry 
not  heaven  within  us,  external  peace  and  beauty  will  never 
produce  it ;  and  heaven  within  us  is  to  be  wrought  in  the 
iTiidst  of  our  corruption  only  by  trial  and  suffering  ;  and 
even  then,  without  continued  discipline,  the  very  piety  of 
the  church  would  cream  and  mantle  like  a  stagnant  pool. 

We  are  aware  that  the  analysis  of  causes  which  we  have 
attempted  is  exceedingly  imperfect,  and  certainly  it  might 
be  pursued  much  farther  with  interest  and  profit.  One  or 
two  conclusions,  from  our  investigation,  are  of  sufficient 
importance  to  lay  up  for  consideration,  if  not  to  dwell  upon 
now.  And  first,  it  is  very  evident  that  a  missionary  spirit 
is  the  only  safe-guard  and  guarantee  of  a  sound  theology. 
If  any  church  or  any  body  of  men  undertake  to  keep  their 
spiritual  privileges  to  themselves,  to  arrogate  an  exclusive 
possession  of  them,  or  to  release  themselves  from  the  claims 
of  Christian  stewardship  and  self-denial  for  others,  they 
will  find  them  putrefying  and  rotting  on  their  hands,  with 
a  brood  of  vipers  generated  in  the  midst  of  them,  a  thou- 
sandfold worse  than  the  stinking  worms  which  the  Israel- 
ites found  in  their  hoarded  manna.  The  very  coriander- 
seed  of  heaven  will  not  keep  from  corruption,  if  men  keep 
it  to  themselves.     Our  religion  and  our  theology  would  be 


AND    THAT    OF    IMITATION.  377 

a  Dead  Sea,  in  which  the  fish  would  die,  and  nothing  but 
the  slime  and  pitch  of  metaphysics,  and  erroneous  and  be- 
wildering speculations,  would  float  upon  the  surface,  if  the 
rippling  waters  of  a  missionary  piety  did  not  flow  through 
it.  The  epistles  of  the  Apostles  themselves  would  have 
been  full  of  thorns  and  weeds  and  poisons,  if  their  piety 
had  not  been  of  such  a  nature  as  to  provide  that  the  Acts 
of  the  Apostles  should  precede  and  accompany  the  Letters. 
The  acrid  humors  and  imposthumes  of  monastic  supersti- 
tions would  have  broken  out  ages  before  they  did,  and  the 
first  Pope  would  have  been  elected  not  at  Rome,  but  at  Je- 
rusalem. 

And  we  may  add,  as  another  conclusion,  that  a  mission- 
ary spirit,  as  it  is  necessary  to  preserve  the  church  from 
the  despotism  of  error  and  of  dogmatism,  so  it  is  the  foun- 
dation of  individual  originality  and  power.  Not  even  the 
word  of  God,  nor  the  study  of  the  word  of  God,  will  keep 
men  from  error,  if  the  heart  be  not  fall  of  love,  and  thirst- 
ing after  God's  knowledge.  The  truths  of  the  gospel  are 
not  to  be  discovered  but  by  moral  discipline,  by  a  hard  fol- 
lowing of  the  sonl  after  God ;  at  any  rate,  not  so  to  be 
discovered  as  to  become  the  elements  of  power.  No  man 
could  be  a  painter  by  seeing  Raphael  put  on  his  colors  ;  no 
man  could  be  a  musician  by  seeing  Apollo  himself  play 
upon  his  pipe  ;  no  man  could  be  a  chemist  by  reading  Sir 
Humphrey  Davy's  dissertations ;  and  no  man  can  be  a 
theologian  by  the  mere  study  of  the  Scriptures.  He  has 
not  only  to  labor  with  the  understanding,  but  to  labor  with 
the  heart,  in  prayer.  It  is  the  want  of  this  latter  labor, 
that  makes  the  piety  of  this  age  imitative  and  external.  It 
produces  individual  darkness  and  weakness,  even  in  the 
midst  of  learning.  Most  admirably  doth  Lord  Bacon  re- 
mark that  "  it  was  most  aptly  said  by  one  of  Plato's  school, 
*  that  the  sense  of  man  carrieth  a  resemblance  with  the 
sun,  which,  as  we  see,  openeth  and  revealeth  all  the  terres- 
trial globe,  but  then  again  it  obscureth  and  concealeth  the 


378  THE    RELIGION    OF    EXPERIENCE, 

stars  and  celestial  globe :  so  doth  the  sense  discover  natural 
things,  but  it  darkeneth  and  shutteth  up  divine.'  '  And 
hence  it  is  true  that  it  hath  proceeded  that  divers  learned 
men  have  been  heretical,  whilst  they  have  sought  to  fly  up 
to  the  secrets  of  the  Deity,  by  the  waxen  wings  of  the 
senses.' "  The  truth  is,  it  is  only  in  God's  light,  that  we 
can  see  the  light.  Who  has  not  known  this  in  his  own  ex- 
perience ?  But  God's  light  never  comes  without  love  ;  and 
there  is  a  light  of  the  understanding  merely,  which  utterly 
fails  to  convince.  Lord  Bacon  commends  the  lumen  sic- 
cum  of  Heraclitus,  as  preferable  to  that  lumen  madidum  or 
viaceratum,  which  is  "  steeped  and  infused  in  the  humors 
of  the  affections ;"  and  this,  with  great  truth,  applied  to 
men's  personal  passions  and  cares.  But  in  reference  to 
God,  there  is  a  lumen  siccum,  a  dry  light,  in  which  the 
mind  dies  for  want  of  moisture  ;  the  fervor  of  the  affections 
constituting  the  only  medium  of  salutary  communication 
with  certain  truths,  of  believing  communion  with  them. 
If  this  be  absent,  and  yet  the  soul  be  carried  into  the  at- 
mosphere of  such  truths,  it  is  quite  intolerable.  It  is  the 
business  of  devils  ;  and  Milton  has  well  set  the  wandering 
spirits  of  hell,  in  their  sadness  and  pain,  to  metaphysical 
reasoning  upon  themes  that  can  no  more  be  handled  with- 
out pain  by  a  heart  not  at  peace  with  God,  than  a  man 
could  take  coals  of  fire  in  his  hand  and  not  be  burned.  The 
highest  atmosphere  of  thought,  to  apply  a  physical  image 
from  this  great  poet,  "  burns  frore,  and  cold  performs  the 
effect  of  heat,"  unless  it  be  a  region  irradiated  by  the  love 
of  God.  There  is  the  same  result  to  the  soul,  which  Hum- 
boldt experienced  in  the  body,  when  ascending  into  a  moun- 
tain air  so  thin  and  rarefied  that  the  lungs  labored  spasmodi- 
cally, and  the  blood  almost  started  from  the  pores. 

To  the  same  purpose,  Ljfljd  Bacon  again  says,  that  ''  the 
quality  of  knowledge,  if  it  be  taken  without  the  corrective 
thereof,  hath  in  it  some  nature  of  venom  or  malignity,  and 
some  effects  of  that  venom,  which  is  ventosity  or  swelling. 


AND    THAT    OF    IMITATION.  379 

The  corrective  spice,"  he  adds,  *'  the  mixture  whereof 
maketh  knowledge  so  sovereign,  is  charity,  as  saith  the 
Apostle."  In  speaking  of  certain  writings,  which  acted  in 
no  slight  degree  to  prevent  his  mind  from  being  imprisoned 
within  the  outlines  of  any  single  dogmatic  system,  Mr. 
Coleridge  presents  a  similar  idea,  with  a  vividness  which  is 
truly  startling.  "  They  contributed,"  says  he,  "  to  keep 
alive  the  heart  in  the  head ;  gave  me  an  indistinct,  yet 
stirring  and  working  presentiment,  that  all  the  products  of 
the  mere  reflective  faculty  partook  of  death,  and  were  as 
the  rattling  twigs  and  sprays  in  winter,  into  which  a  sap 
was  yet  to  be  propelled  from  some  root  to  which  I  had  not 
yet  penetrated,  if  they  were  to  afford  my  soul  either  food 
or  shelter." 

That  root,  we  believe,  was  Christ.  And  now  let  me 
add  that  there  are  some  truths,  of  essential  importance  to 
the  world's  becoming  better,  of  which  we  venture  to  say, 
no  man  can  have  such  a  belief  as  to  constitute  any  power 
in  the  use  of  them,  without  much  acquaintance  with  God 
in  Christ.  Take  for  example,  the  very  universally  ac- 
knowledged truth  of  the  eternal  damnation  of  wicked  souls. 
There  is  no  man  that  can  believe  this  truth,  especially  as 
applied  to  the  heathen,  with  anything  more  than  the  belief 
of  assent  and  of  custom,  with  the  unassailable  belief  of 
power,  without  seeing  and  feeling  the  holiness  of  God  ;  and 
the  holiness  of  God  is  not  to  be  seen  and  felt,  without  a 
close  walk  with  God.  Not  one  of  God's  attributes  is  to  be 
known  without  heart-labor^  and  yet  it  is  in  the  knowledge 
of  God's  attributes,  that  all  sound  theology  consists.  And 
this  truth,  of  which  we  have  spoken,  is  at  the  very  founda- 
tion of  the  whole  missionary  enterprise. 

I  wish  now  to  beg  your  attention  to  one  more  conclu- 
sion, which,  as  those  who  hear  me  are  young  men,  and  as 
we  are  parts  of  a  young  nation,  cannot  but  sink  down  deep 
into  our  minds,  and  I  would  hope  may  happily  influence 
our  own  self-discipline.     It  is,  that  in  the  life  of  individ- 


380 

uals  and  of  nations,  the  provision  of  the  materials  of  origi- 
nality, experience,  and  power  in  the  character,  is  confined 
for  the  most  part  to  a  particular  and  an  early  period. 

"  The  CHILD  is  father  of  the  man." 

Our  great  modern  poet  has  put  this  great  truth  into  a 
child's  ballad,  but  it  is  for  men  to  reflect  upon.  In  the 
development  whether  of  individuals  or  of  nations  it  is  true. 
The  early  studies  of  genius  are  wrought  into  the  mind  like 
beautiful  pictures  traced  in  sympathetic  ink,  and  they 
afterwards  come  out  into  view  in  the  influence  they  exert 
in  all  the  mind's  productions.  The  first  studies  of  Rem- 
brandt affected  his  after  labors  ;  that  peculiarity  of  shadow, 
which  marks  all  his  pictures,  originated  in  the  circum- 
stance of  his  father's  mill  receiving  light  from  an  aperture 
at  the  top,  which  habituated  that  artist  afterwards  to  view 
all  objects  as  if  seen  in  that  magical  light.  What  is  thus 
true  in  the  course  of  individuals,  is  as  true,  on  a  vast  scale, 
in  the  development  of  the  literature  and  character  of 
nations. 

Now  our  practice  of  the  science  of  self-culture  and  self- 
discipline  is  to  too  great  a  degree  extemporaneous  and  late ; 
nor  do  we  suflSciently  avail  ourselves  of  others'  experience. 
It  is  certainly  important  to  discover  what  has  been  the 
nourishment  of  other  minds,  and  then  to  apply  your  knowl- 
edge. It  is  not  certain  that  the  same  discipline,  through 
which  Burke  or  Coleridge  passed,  would  be  as  good  for 
other  minds  as  for  theirs ;  but  there  must  have  been  some 
qualities  in  their  mental  culture,  some  processes  in  their 
growth  and  development,  which,  discovered  and  applied  by 
us,  would  be  useful.  For  example,  if  Mr.  Coleridge  tells 
us  that  in  early  life  he  found  in  certain  rare  and  neglected 
volumes,  some  trains  of  thought  that  set  him  powerfully  to 
thinking,  you  may  be  quite  sure  that  the  same  excitement 
would  be  favorable  to  a  susceptible  and  growing  mind  now. 
But  it  may  happen  that  the  seed  which  will  grow  in  one 


AND    THAT    OF    IMITATION.  381 

patch  of  ground  will  not  in  another.  You  may  raise  a 
good  crop  of  potatoes  where  you  cannot  raise  wheat,  and 
the  soil  that  will  bear  a  wheat  crop  one  year,  will  do 
better  laid  out  in  corn  and  melons  the  next.  Now  nature 
seems  to  require  somewhat  the  same  alterations  in  the  cul- 
tivation of  mind ;  at  any  rate  there  is  no  monotony.  An 
age  of  great  classical  erudition  may  be  succeeded  by  an  age 
of  deep  philosophy,  or  these  both  by  an  age  of  physical  sci- 
ence and  railroads ;  and  you  may  not  be  able,  without 
difficulty,  to  trace  the  laws  or  causes  of  this  change.  If 
you  cut  down  a  forest  of  pines,  there  will  spring  up  in  its 
place  a  growth  of  the  oak  or  the  maple.  So  in  the  world's 
mind  there  are  the  germs  of  many  developments,  to  which 
external  accidents  may  give  birth,  some  in  one  age,  some 
in  another.  There  is  a  singular  analogy  between  the 
goings  on  of  life  in  the  natural  and  in  the  moral  world,  and 
nature  many  times  suggests  lessons  which  she  does  not 
directly  teach.  Nature  is  suggestive  in  her  teachings ; 
and  so  is  the  word  of  God  ;  and  so  is  everything  that  in  its 
teachings  at  the  same  time  awakens  and  disciplines  the 
mind. 

But  there  is  a  period,  after  which  even  suggestive  teach- 
ings and  suggestive  books  lose  their  power.  There  is  a 
germinating  period,  a  period  in  which  a  good  book  goes 
down  into  the  soul,  as  a  precious  seed  into  a  moist  furrow 
of  earth  in  the  spring,  and  germinates  ;  a  new  growth 
springs  from  it.  It  is  different  from  knowledge  ;  it  becomes 
the  mind's  own,  and  is  reproduced  in  a  form  of  originality ; 
its  principles  become  seeds  in  a  man's  being,  and  by  and 
by  blossom  and  fructify.  This,  I  say,  is  a  particular  period, 
and  it  does  not  last.  A  man  who  has  passed  it  may  read 
the  same  book  and  knoiv  it  perfectly  ;  the  acquisition  of 
knowledge  goes  on  through  life  ;  but  knowledge  as  life, 
knowledge  as  the  creator  of  wisdom,  not  so.  It  is  all  the 
difference  between  an  oak  set  out,  and  one  that  grows  from 
the  acorn.     I  have  in  my  mind  some  volumes  which  have 


382  THE    RELIGION    OF    EXPERIENCE, 

exerted  a  refreshing  and  inspiring  power  over  many  young 
minds,  but  with  older  ones  the  power  does  not  seem  to  exist ; 
it  is  like  putting  a  magnet  to  a  lump  of  clay.  Except  a 
corn  of  wheat  fall  into  the  ground  and  die,  it  abideth  alone ; 
and  so,  except  a  good  book  fall  into  the  soul  and  die,  it 
abideth  alone  ;  and  the  time  in  which  a  good  book  thus  dies 
in  the  soul,  is  particular  and  analogous  to  the  spring  tide 
of  the  seasons.  An  ear  of  corn  may  fall  into  the  ground 
and  die  in  midsummer  ;  but  it  will  not  be  reproduced  ;  and 
just  so  with  books  and  principles  in  men's  mind :  if  the 
sowing  of  them  be  deferred  till  the  midsummer  or  autumn 
of  the  soul,  though  the}'^  may  enrich  the  soil,  they  will  not 
produce  a  harvest ;  there  may  be  the  green  blade,  but  the 
full  corn  in  the  ear  you  will  never  see. 

So  also  it  is  with  the  seeds  and  habits  of  our  piety  ;  our 
character  and  attainments,  not  only  in  this  world,  but  in 
eternity,  will  be  the  fruits  of  the  germination  of  divine  things 
in  our  souls  now. 

Let  me  pray  you,  therefore,  to  take  care  of  the  germi- 
nating period  of  your  being  ;  for  when  you  have  passed 
through  it,  though  you  may  have  the  same  books  to  read, 
and  the  same  means  of  study,  they  will  not  affect  you  as 
they  once  would.  There  is  a  tide  in  the  deep  souls  of  men, 
as  well  as  in  their  affairs,  which,  taken  at  the  flood,  leads 
on  to  fortune ;  and  if  you  omit  it,  the  loss  and  the  misery 
will  be  yours.  Suffer  me  now  to  leave  your  minds  beneath 
the  influence  of  one  more  aphorism  from  the  wisdom  of 
Lord  Bacon.  '•'  For  if  you  will  have  a  tree  bear  more  fruit 
than  it  hath  used  to  do,  it  is  not  anything  you  can  do  to 
the  boughs,  but  it  is  the  stirring  of  the  earth,  and  putting 
new  mould  about  the  roots,  that  must  work  it."  And  if 
we  might  add  one  recipe  as  to  the  sort  of  mould  you  would 
do  well  to  apply,  we  ^vould  say,  take  the  study  of  Butler's 
Analogy,  South's  Sermons,  (avoiding  his  hatred  of  the 
Puritans,)  Bacon's  Advancement  of  Learning,  Burke's 
Character  and  Works,  John  Foster's  Essays,  and  (bating 


r 


AND    THAT    OF    IMITATION.  383 


his  erroneous  views  of  the  atonement)  Coleridge's  F'riend, 
and  Aids  to  Reflection.  This  is  but  a  single  formula ;  you 
well  know  the  catalogue  might  be  greatly  varied  and  en- 
larged ;  and  different  men  will  put  down  different  authors, 
according  to  their  own  idiosyncracies.  But  we  speak  now 
of  suggestive  works  ;  and  the  Latin  proverb  is  worth  re- 
membering. Beware  of  the  man  of  one  book. 


^nrex 


THE    END. 


^  AN 

I  ALPHABETICAL   CATALOGUE 

^  OF 

i  STANDARD  AND  MISCELLANEOUS  WORKS, 

S  PUBLISHED      BY 

j  JOHN    WILEY, 

^  161  BROADWAY,  NEW  YORK  ;  AND  13  PATERNOSTER  ROW,  LONDON. 

">  TOaETHER.    WITH 

J  QV  tot  of  (Sniglisl),  iTrencI),  anb  ©crman  IJeriairicds. 

I  ^  IMPORTATION  OF  BOOKS 


ENGLAND,  FRANCE,  GERMANY,  ITALY,  SPAIN,  AND  RUSSIA, 

BY    THE     QUANTITY  OR     SINGLE    VOLUME. 


I      The  Subscribar,  through  his  own  estdbli^hment  at  13  Paternoster  Row,  London 

I   (established  in  J838),  and  by  an  Agency  on  the  Continent,  is  able  to  give  the  most  careful  } 

>   attention  to  all  Orders  from  Private  Individuals,  Booksellers,  and  Public  Institu-  S 
',   tions,  for  Books,  Stationery,  Maps,  &c.,  which  will  always  bs  furnished  on  the  most 

;;   favorable  terms,  and  with  the  greatest  di:?patch.  > 

i       Catalogues  of  New  Books  publiihed  in  London,  with  cheap  lists,  &.''  .are  put  up  ^ 

5   monthly  in  small  packages,  and  forwarded  "ratis  to  fll  who  miy  desire  them.    Particular  ^ 

^   attention  is  also  given  to  the  procuring  of  old  an;l  8car(;k  books,  by  means  of  advertis-  ^ 

5    ing,  &c.,  &.C.  «  < 

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orders  promptly  attended  to,  provided  they  are  addressed  "'John  Wilky,  13  Paternoster  ,> 

Row,  London,"  and  accompmied  with  a  remittance  or  satls&ctory  reference.  ,- 

BOOKS,     &o.,     DUTY     FREE.  < 

*»*  By  a  recflnt  .Set  of  Congress,  all  Colleges,  Academies,  Seminaries  of  Learn-  > 

iNG,  or  other  Societies  estahlisiied  for  Philosophical  or  Literary  purposes,  or  ? 

roR  THE  encouraoement  ok  the  Fine  Arts,  Riiy  import  Books,  Map^,  Coins,  Sta-  ^ 

TUARY,  Philosophical  Apparatu<.  &c  ,  free  of  duty.    Public  institutions  of  this  de  ? 
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ORDERS   FORWARDED    BY   EVERY   STEAMER; 

ami  if  the  books  can  bs  rcaii'y  procure!,  they  will  be  received  by  return  steamer. 


JOHN  WILEY 

HAS   IN   PREPARATION   AND   WILL    SHORTLY    PUBLISH, 


DOWNING'S  COUNTRY   HOUSES;  or,  New  Designs  for  Rural  Cottages,  Farm-  j 

Houses,  and  Villas,  with  Interiors  and  Furniture.  S 

DOWNINGS  FRUIT  AND  FRUIT  TREES  OF  ANIERICA.-In  12ino.    Tenth  I 

Edition.  ^ 

DOWNINGS  FRUITS,  COLORED   PLATES.  S 

***  The  Plates  of  this  elegant  volume  will  be  colored  in   Paris,  where  every  attention  ? 

will  be  given  to  secure  a  perfect  representation  of  the  original  designs,  \ 

A  SUPPLEMENT  TO  THE   FRUITS  AND   FRUIT  TREES.— In  one  volume  S 

12rao.  > 

DR.  CHEEVERS  LECTURES  ON   THE   PILGRIM'S  PROGRESS,  and  the  < 

Life  and  Times  of  John  Bunyan. — In  one  thick  vol.  of  over  500  pages,  13n(io.  cloth,  s 

A  New  Edition.  S 

CHEEVERS  DEFENCE   OF  CAPITAL    PU  N  ISHMENT.-A   new  edition  in  \ 

one  vol.  12mo.  cloth.  s 

s 

CHEEVER'S    MISCELLANIES.— Including  Deacon  Giles's  Distillery,  &c.     In  one  >, 

vol.  12mo.  I 

WANDERINGS  OF  A   PILGRIM  IN   THE  ALPS,  in  the  Shadow  of  Mont  Blanc  \ 

and  the  Jungfrau. — A  new  edition  in  one  vol.  ]2nio.  i 

LEGENDS  OF  THE  DOCOTAHS.— By  Mrs.  Mary  H.  Eastman.    With  an  Tntro-  > 

ductory  Preface  by  Mrs.  C.  M.  Kirkiand.    In  one  vol.  12mo.  > 

BOWDLER'S  FAMILY  SHAKSPEARE.— In  one  vol.    In  which  nothin-;  is  add<-d  \ 

to  the  original  text ;  but  those  words  and  expressions  are  omitted  which  cannot  with  S 

propriety  be  read  aUnid  in  a  family.     From  the   sixth  London  Edition.     In  one  vol.  5 

8vo.  cloth.        *  I 

TUPPER'S  POETICAL  WO  RKS.— This  volume  will  include  Proverbial  Philosophy,  < 

a  Thousand  Lines,  Hactenuf,  and  other  later  effusions.  S 

A   HISTORY  OF  THE   MEXICAN  WAR  ;  with  a  Preliminary  View  of  the  Cauiosi  j 

that  led  to  it.     In  8vo  illustrated  with   maps  and  plans.     By  Brantz  Mayor,  formerly  •> 

Secretary  of  the  U.  S.  Legation  to  Mexico,  and  Author  of  "Mexico  as  it  Was  and  Is."  ^ 

*:**  This  work  will  be  an  nuthentic  historical  narr.itive,  drawn  from  original  source*,  I 

Illustrated  by  plans  of  the  battles,  6rc.,  obtriined  from  the  War  Department.     It  will  be  pre-  < 

pared  in  the  style  of  Napier's  Peninsulnr  Campaigns,  and  will  be  valuable  in  the  library  of  ^ 

the  student,  as  well  as  popular  in  the  drawing  room.  < 

HALF  HOURS  WITH    THE    BEST  AUTHORS,— With  short  Biographical  and  I 

Critical  Notices.     Vol.3,  12mo.  < 

A  GUIDE  TO  HYDROPATHY  ;  or,  Every  Mnn  his  own  Doctor.    By  Captain  Cia-  < 

ridge,  Author  of  "  Hydropathy,"  "Facts  and   Evidence,"  &c.    This  work,  which  ^ 

shows  how  almost  every  disease  should  be  treated,  is  the  result  of  the  Author's  obser-  ^ 

Tations  and  experience  during  eight  years,  confirnud  by  twelve  months'  residence  at  ^ 

Graefenberg,  where  it  was  corrected  by  Priessnitz  himself.  e 


JOHN  WILEY'S  LIST 


LATE  PUBLICATIONS. 


V 


Alexander,  Prof.  J.  A. 

THE  EARLIER   AND    LATER  PROPHECIES   OF  ISAIAH.     In  i 

2  Vols.  Roy.  Svo.  cloth,  $5  50.  i 

"  The  sound,  independent  judgment  which  Prof.  Alexander  everywhere  displays,  com-  > 

bined  with  true  cindor.  modesty,  and  a  spirit  of  profound  reverence  for  the  inspired  S 

volume,  distinguishes  his  work  most  advantageously  from  most  of  the  critical  productions  < 

of  the  age,  and  entitles  it  to  be  regarded  .is  a  model  of  Biblical  investigatiou."— Z-ondon  > 

Patriot.  > 

"  A  rich  contribution  of  philological  exposition  for  the  use  of  the  clergy.""— Presbyterian.  > 

Alexander.— The  Later  Prophecies  of  Isaiah.  I 

Royal  Svo.  cloth,  $2  50.  \ 

"  A  commentary  of  higher  aim  than  the  unfolding  of  a  poem,  and  of  profounder  character    > 

than  a  mere  repository  of  suggestive  practical  thoughts." — JV*.  Y.  Recorder.  ^ 

Amber  Witch,  The ;  Or,  Mary  Schweidler.  | 

Tlie  most  interesting  Trial  for  Witchcraft  ever  known.     Edited  by   > 

Dr.  Meinhold.     Translated  from  the  German,  by  Lady  DufF  Gordon.    5 

12 mo.  cloth,  50  cts.  \ 

'■  A  beauliful  fiction,  worthy  of  De  Foe." — Quarterly  Review.  < 

"The  critics  of  Ur.  IMcinhoId  were  fairly  taken  in,  by  his  art  stepping  so  exactly  in  the   < 

footprints  of  nature." — Dem  Review.  < 

Armstrong,  Major-General. 

NOTICES  OF  THE  WAR  01^^  1S12.     In  -3  vols.  12uio.  cloth,  <*!  50.   j 

Atheists— Voltaire  and  Rousseau  against  them  ;        | 

Or,  Essays  and  Detached  Passao:e3  from  those  Writers,  in  Relation  to  ^ 
the  Being  and  Attributes  of  God.  Selected  and  Translated  by  J.  s 
Akerly.     12tno.  cloth,  50  cts.  > 

Bartlett,  Prof.  W.  H.  C— Optics.  \ 

AN  ELEMRNTARY  TREATISE  ON  OPTICS,  Designed  for  the  > 
Use  of  the  Cadets  of  the  U.  S.  Military  Academy.  Containing  8  fold-  s 
ing  plates.     Svo.  cloth,  $2  I 


John  Wiley's  tdst  of  Late  Fuhl? cations. 


Beckford,  Wm.,  Author  of  "  Vathek." 

ITALY,  SPAIN,  AND    PORTUGAL ;   With   an   Excursion   to   the 


'>  Monasteries  of  Alcoba^a  and  Batalha.     2  parts  in  1  vol.  r2ino.  cloth,  !^ 

$i  25.  i 

>  "Plensinn;  and  picturesque  as  the  clime  .ind  places  visited,  this  is  just  the  book  for  the  ? 
S  indulgence  of  the  '  dolcefar  niente.'  " — London  Lit.  Oaz.  > 
S       "  Rich  in  scenes  of  beauty  and  of  life." — Lond.  ^thencewn.  i 

\  fieecher,  Revd.  Edward,  D.D.  Baptism  ;  \ 

\  With  reference  to  its  Import  and  Modes.     In  1  vol.  12mo.  cloth,  $1  25.  ^ 

"The  spirit  of  the  scholar  and  Christian  is  conspicuous  throughout ;  and  in  its  ciindid,  ? 

I   thorough  manner,  its  excellent  feeiinfj,  and  its  able  argumpntritinn,  it  strikes  us  as   more  > 

;   nearly  realizing  the  fteou  ideai  of  doctrinal  controversy  than  isj  generally  found."— JV.  Y.  ^ 

;    Evangelist.  ^ 

\  Bible.  \ 

?  PATRICK,  LOWTH,  ARNALD,  WHITBY,   AND  LOWMAN.     A  J 

Critical  Commentary  and  Paraphrase  on  the  Cfld  and  New  Testaments,  ;, 

and  the  Apocrypha.     A  new  edition,  with  the  text  printed  at  large,  '^ 

in  4  thick  vols,  royal  Svo   cloth,  .^IS  ;  sheep,  $'16  50.  \ 

*^*  Numerous  testimoni  Us  hive  been  obtiined  frim  the  most  learned  divines  of  various  '• 

dem)miDations  in  this  country,  respecting  the  value  of  these  expositions.  "", 

Bibliothcca  Sacra  and  Theological  Review.  \ 

Conducted  by  Profs.  Edwards,  Park,  Robinsun,  and  Stuart.    Published   i 
*r^  quarterly,  $i  each  number,  yearly  subscription  $i.     Vols.  1,  2,  3,  and  f 

^  ^,  in  cloth  binding  and  back  numbers,  will  bo  furnished  at  a  discount  » 

<  of  2'»  per  cent,  from  the  retail  price.  ^ 

I  "This  Review  continues  to  sustain  its  h'gb  character  as  the  ablest  periodical  in  the,: 
"■,    language,  ill  theologicil  and  Biblical  literature."  ^ 

\  Blanchard,  Laman.— Sketches  fi'om  Life.  \ 

>  ■ '  s" 
5  ^         Edi^l^with  a  Memoir  of  the  Author,  by  Bulwor.     12rno.  cloth,  $1.     \ 

]  "  .\inUN«»i|jeht  atid  in>.triiciinn  conveynil-iT  a  sH-lo,  th  )  hi^aufv  of  which   his  not  been  ^ 

,^  surpassed  by  any  of  the  writer's  Co. itfiiip-HTriries." — Dickens's  Mews.  ^ 

]  "The  memoir  is  one  of  the  iDo'^t  aff-cli.ig  piocos  of  hioirnphv  th-it  we  have  ever  read,  J 

>  and  is  alike  hoiiorable  to  thosubj'^ct  and  the  author." — JYew  Bedford  Mercury.  ^ 

\  Bradford,  A.  W.— American  Antiquities.  : 


And  Researches  into  the   Origin   and   Ilistorv  of  the  Red  Race.     Svo.  \ 

\  cloth,  $1  25.  "  ^ 

I       *^*  A  phiIos()phic,i^||id  elaborate  investisnt'on  of  a  subject  which  h  la  excited  much  ^ 

>   r.lteniion.    This  nble  W^k  is  a  very  desirable  companion  to  those  of  Stephens  and  others  s 

I  cinthe  Ruiiw«f  Central  America.  \ 


i 


Bradford,  Wni.  J.  A.— Notes  on  the  North  West ; 

Or,  Valley  of  the  Upper  Mississippi :  comprising  the  country  between 
Lakes  Superior  and  Michigan,  E;ist ;  the  Illinois  and  Missouri  Rivers, 


mt 


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4^^^^ 


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^■.:' 


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8EP 


14  DAY  USE 

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RENEWALS  ONLY-^TEL.  NO.  642-3405 

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